Scarlet Letters: Fictions of Adultery from Antiquity to the 1990s

236 Pages·1997·23.79 MB·English

by  Nicholas White

SCARLET LEITERS
AlsobyNaomi Segal
THE BANALOBJECT:ThemeandThematicsin Proust,Rilke,
HofmannsthaIandSartre
THE UNINTENDEDREADER: Feminismand ManonLescaut
NARCISSUSAND ECHO:Women in the FrenchRecit
FREUDIN EXILE: Psychoanalysisand its Vicissitudes (co-editor
withEdwardTimms)
THE ADULTERESS'SCHILD:Authorshipand Desire in the
Nineteenth-CenturyNovel
Scarlet Letters
Fictions of Adultery
from Antiquity to the 1990s
Nicholas White
Departmento[Frenclt
RoyalHolloway, Universityo[London
and
NaomiSegal
Departmenio[Frencn Studies
Universityo[Reading
First publishedinGreatBritain 1997by
MACMILLANPRESSLTD
Houndmills,Basingstoke,HampshireRG21 6XSandLondon
Companiesandrepresentativesthroughoutthewor1d
Acataloguerecord forthisbook isavailablefrom theBritish Library.
ISBN 978-0-333-68430-6 ISBN978-1-349-25446-0(eBook)
DOI 10.1007/978-1-349-25446-0
Firstpublishedinthe UnitedStatesofAmerica 1997by
ST.MARTIN'SPRESS,INC..
ScholarlyandReferenceDivision.
175FifthAvenue.NewYork,N.Y. 10010
ISBN 978-0-312-17307-4
LibraryofCongressCataloging-in-PublicationData
Scarletletters : fictions ofadultery fromantiquitytothe 1990's /
Nicholas Whiteand NaomiSegal.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographicalreferencesandindex.
ISBN 978-0-312-17307-4
I.Adultery inliterature. 2.Ficlion-Historyandcriticism.
I.White,Nicholas, 1967- .11.Segal, Naomi.
PN3352.A38S29 1997
809.3'9353-dc21 96-51669
CIP
Editorial matterandselection©NicholasWhiteand NaomiSegal 1997
Text ©MacmillanPressLid 1997
Softcoverreprintofthe hardcover Ist 1997
Allrightsreserved. Noreproduction,copyortransmissionofthispublicationmaybemade
without writtenpermission.
No paragraph ofthis publication may be reproduced, copied or transmitted save with
written permission or in accordance with the provisions of the Copyright. Designs and
Patents Act 1988.or under the terms ofany licence permitting limited copying issued by
theCopyrightLicensingAgency, 90TottenhamCourt Road, London WIP9HE.
Any person whodoes any unauthorised act inrelation tothis publicationmay beliable to
criminalprosecutionandcivilclaims fordamages.
The authors have asserted their rights to be identified as the authors of this work in
accordancewith theCopyright.Designs andPatents Act 1988.
This book is printed on paper suitable for recycling and made from fully managed and
sustainedforestsources.
10 9 8 7 6 5 432 1
06 05 04 03 02 01 00 99 98 97
This bookis dedicated to the memoryofMarieMaclean
Contents
Page
Notes ontheContributors ix
NicholasWhite Introduction:ThePresentState
ofAffairs 1
I BEFOREMODERNITY
1 Marie Maclean The Heirs ofAmphitryon:Sodal
FathersandNaturalFathers 13
2 SarahKay AdulteryandKillingin .
LaMortleroiArtu 34
3 ElizabethGuild Adulteryon trial:MartinGuerre
andhis wife,from judge'staleto
the screen 45
4 [oanDeJean NotoriousWomen:Marriageand the
Novelin Crisis inFrance 1690-1710 56
5 ClaireLamont 'Let otherpensdweIl on guiltand
misery': Adulteryin[aneAusten 70
11 THEHIGHAGEOFADULTERY:CONTEXTS
6 FeliciaGordon LegitimationandIronyinTolstoy
and Fontane 85
7 [o Labanyi Adulteryand the Exchange
Economy 98
8 NaomiSegal The Adulteress's Children 109
9 NicholasWhite CamalKnowledgein French
NaturalistFiction 123
10 D.A.Williams PatriarchalIdeologyand French
Fictions ofAdultery1830-57 134
vii
vili ScarletLetters
m THEHIGHAGEOFADULTERY:TEXTS
11 Mary Hamer No Fairy-tale:the Story ofMarriagein
Trollope'sHeKnewHeWasRight 149
12 Maria ManuelLisboa Machadode Assisandthe Beloved
Reader:Squattersin the Text 160
13 AlisonSinclair TheNeedforZealandthe Dangers
ofJealousy:IdentityandLegitimacy
inLaRegenta 174
IV FILMSANDFICTIONS
14 Michael Wood No Second Chances:Fictionand
Adulteryin Vertigo 189
15 NaomiSegal The FatalAttractionofThePiano 199
16 JonathanSmith DissolvingAdultery:Domesticity
andObscenityin TheGame 212
Index 229
Notes on the Contributors
Joan DeJean (University of Pennsylvania, USA), author of Tender
Geographies (Columbia University Press) and Fictions 0/ Sappho
1546-1937(Chicago).
FeliciaGordon(AngliaUniversity,UK),authorofTheIntegralFeminist:
Madeleine Pelletier 1874-1939 (Polity) and APre/ace to theBronies
(Longman).
ElizabethGuild(UniversityofCambridge,UK),authorofarticleson
feministtheoryandRenaissanceliterature,e.g.'TheAbbedeChoisy'
in RomanicReview(1994).
Mary Hamer (University of Cambridge, UK), author of Signs0/
CIeopatra:History, Politics, Representation (Routledge) and TroIIope's
SerialFiction (CambridgeUniversityPress).
Sarah Kay (University of Cambridge, UK), authorof Subjectivity in
TroubadourPoetry(CambridgeUniversityPress)andFramingMedieval
Bodies (ManchesterUniversityPress).
JoLabanyi (University of London, UK), authorof The Politics 0/the
Family in the Spanish Realist Novel and Myth and History in the
Contemporary Spanish Novel (OxfordUniversityPress).
ClaireLamont(UniversityofNewcastle,UK),authorofmanyarticles
and editions, e.g. Sense andSensibility, Waverley and The Heart 0/
Midlothian (OxfordUniversityPress).
Maria Manuel Lisboa (University of Cambridge, UK), author of
MachadodeAssis(EdwinMeilen)andarticlesonlusophoneliterature
and criticaltheory.
Marie Maclean (MonashUniversity, Australia), authorof Narrative
asPerformance:TheBaudelaireanExperimentandTheName0/theMother:
WritingIIIegitimacy (Routledge).
ix
x Scarlet Letters
NaomiSegal(UniversityofReading,UK),authorofNarcissusandEcho
(ManchesterUniversityPress) and TheAdulteress'sChild (Polity).
AlisonSinclair(UniversityofCambridge,UK),authorofTheDeceived
Husband:a Kleinian Approachto the Literature0/Fidelity (Oxford
UniversityPress).
JonathanSmith(UniversityofManchester,UK),authorofarticles on
social,ethnic andsexualidentities,ego'Realismandpost-structuralism'
in ltalianStudies(1994).
Nicholas White (University of London, UK), author of editions of
L'Assommoir(Everyman) andA Rebours (OxfordUniversityPress).
D.A. Williams (University of Hull, UK), author of Les Scenarios de
l'Educaiionsentimentale(Corti) andTheMonsterintheMirror(Oxford
UniversityPress).
MichaelWood(PrincetonUniversity,USA),authorofAmericainthe
Movies and ThePrisons0/Paradise(ColumbiaUniversityPress).