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Marguerite de Navarre's Heptameron, composed in the 1540s and first
published posthumously in 1558 and 1559, has long been an
interpretive puzzle. De Navarre (1492-1549), sister of King Francis
I of France, was a controversial figure in her lifetime. Her
evangelical activities and proximity to the Crown placed her at the
epicenter of her country's internecine strife and societal unrest.
Yet her short stories appear to offer few traces of the
sociopolitical turbulence that surrounded her.In Marguerite de
Navarre's Shifting Gaze, however, Elizabeth Zegura argues that the
Heptameron's innocuous appearance camouflages its serious insights
into patriarchy and gender, social class, and early modern French
politics, which emerge from an analysis of the text's shifting
perspectives. Zegura's approach, which focuses on visual cues and
alternative standpoints and viewing positions within the text,
hinges upon foregrounding "les choses basses" (lowly things) to
which the devisante (storyteller) Oisille draws our attention in
nouvelle (novella) 2 of the Heptameron, using this downward,
archaeological gaze to excavate layers of the text that merit more
extensive critical attention.While her conclusions cast a new light
on the literature, life, and times of Marguerite de Navarre, they
are nevertheless closely aligned with recent scholarship on this
important historical and literary figure.
Marguerite de Navarre's Heptameron, composed in the 1540s and first
published posthumously in 1558 and 1559, has long been an
interpretive puzzle. De Navarre (1492-1549), sister of King Francis
I of France, was a controversial figure in her lifetime. Her
evangelical activities and proximity to the Crown placed her at the
epicenter of her country's internecine strife and societal unrest.
Yet her short stories appear to offer few traces of the
sociopolitical turbulence that surrounded her.In Marguerite de
Navarre's Shifting Gaze, however, Elizabeth Zegura argues that the
Heptameron's innocuous appearance camouflages its serious insights
into patriarchy and gender, social class, and early modern French
politics, which emerge from an analysis of the text's shifting
perspectives. Zegura's approach, which focuses on visual cues and
alternative standpoints and viewing positions within the text,
hinges upon foregrounding "les choses basses" (lowly things) to
which the devisante (storyteller) Oisille draws our attention in
nouvelle (novella) 2 of the Heptameron, using this downward,
archaeological gaze to excavate layers of the text that merit more
extensive critical attention.While her conclusions cast a new light
on the literature, life, and times of Marguerite de Navarre, they
are nevertheless closely aligned with recent scholarship on this
important historical and literary figure.
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