This article looks at French working-class lesbian culture from 1882-1930 and notes that a lot of previous coverage of French culture in this era has focused on the demi-monde, artists, and salon culture. The author challenges the assertion by some historians that a history of this sort—at the intersection of gender and class—is impossible to write. The decadent esthetic and visions of the Belle Epoque stand in contrast to the experiences of the working class. This was an era of union and feminist movements. WWI stepped up women’s participation in the industrial workforce.
France
Covering approximately the region of modern France in western Europe, or to topics relating to French-language culture in Europe.
LHMP entry
Among the political propaganda published during the French Revolution against Queen Marie-Antoinette (MA, for convenience) was a prominent theme of her sexual profligacy, and in particular the charge that she engaged in lesbian sex (as well as other sexual charges). In this context, her lesbian relations were depicted, not an accompaniment or “appetizer” to heterosexual acts (as often presented in pornography of the time), but as a preference.
Following a long tradition of framing f/f sex as “something newly prominent,” the French Mémoires Secrets of 1784 asserted it had “never been flaunted with as much scandal and show as today.” But while male homosexuals were arrested by the hundreds, far less attention was given to women, leaving fewer traces for historians to reconstruct. One notable exception is the actress Mademoiselle de Raucourt.
In 18th century France, philosophy and pornography intersected to a degree such that “philosophical texts” became a euphemism for sexual content, including a regular interest in same-sex relations. Among critiques of society and politics, enlightenment philosophers debated traditional understandings and condemnation of homosexuality. This included the radical idea that all sexuality was natural and morally neutral, and that the state should not regulate it.
The introduction reviews the history of feminist literary criticism and notes that it has tended to focus on prose. Multiple filters and gatekeeping mechanisms stand in the way of presenting non-Anglophone feminist poetry to a larger audience. Feminine stereotypes have pressured women poets into restrictive genres: domesticity, romance, religion, etc. This collection seeks out pets and poems that operate against this restriction.
This is the most extensive article I’ve found concerning an early 15th century French legal case that is often cited in lists of medieval European evidence for lesbianism. It includes a full translation of the original records (although it doesn’t include the full original text). The article emphasizes interpreting this case in the context of other legal cases with which it shares features, specifically other applications for royal pardon and other records involving sexual offenses, especially those involving same-sex activity.
This dissertation didn’t have quite as much information about actresses as I thought it might. The majority of the focus is on playwrights—which is wonderful and informative! But I ended up skimming a lot to pull out the bits on actresses.
This analysis considers the parallels in the emergence of women as central the public stage and the private salon, both of which opened up new roles, and both of which became a focus of morality-based criticism, taking the view that women “putting themselves forward” was inherently dangerous to feminine morals.
When we think of dramatic performance by courtiers, masques tend to be the first image, but this article examines the performance of stage plays by the English court under Henrietta Maria, Queen to Charles I. The queen was French and imported French attitudes and expectations to the sphere where she could set the rules. In particular, she greatly increased women’s performance on the court stages, and amateur women’s theatricals became a regular feature of the court.
Despite the prominence of the word “tribadism” in the article title, it has only a small focus on this topic. The overall focus is on the public reputations and images of actresses in late 18th century French (especially Parisian) society, and particularly how those reputations and images had political overtones. Prominent actresses participated in a public economy of “pop culture” that would be familiar to people today, including the availability of souveniers and being the focus of gossip rags.
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