Enchanted Eloquence: Fairy Tales by Seventeenth-Century French Women Writers (review)

With Enchanted Eloquence: Fairy Tales by Seventeenth-Century French Women Writers, Lewis C. Seifert and Domna C. Stanton offer a collection of eight French fairy tales translated into English; most have never been translated before.

The book is divided into three main sections: the “Editors’ Introduction,” “Fairy Tales by Seventeenth-Century Conteuses,” and the “Critical Texts on the Contes de Fées.” Seven black and white illustrations are also included, mostly frontispieces and portraits. Even though only eight fairy tales are presented in this volume, the useful appendix lists the English titles of the sixty tales written at that time by Marie-Catherine le Jumel de Barneville, Baronne d’Aulnoy; Louise de Bossigny, Comtesse d’Auneuil; Catherine Bernard; Catherine Bédacier Durand; Charlotte-Rose de Caumont de La Force; Marie-Jeanne L’Héritier de Villandon; and Henriette-Julie de Castelnau, Comtesse de Murat.

The “Editors’ Introduction” presents an informative and well-researched summary of the fairy-tale genre with its cultural and literary context during the Louis XIV era, as well as an account of the voice and empowerment of the conteuses (female storytellers). The introduction also analyzes the critical reception of the tales across the centuries. General but nonetheless instructive, the introduction furnishes a wonderful overview of the fairy-tale genre in seventeenth-century France.

The strength of the introduction lies in the analytic and enlightening manner in which the editors review and explore the literary fairy tale’s vogue. The genre, Seifert and Stanton remind us, is primarily dominated by female writers, as two-thirds of the tales were produced by women (3). However, there was also a group of male authors, Charles Perrault being the most well-known (although his tales display a different style from his contemporaries). The editors reveal how the literary tales probably appeared in the mid-seventeenth-century salons and how this community of women created a new genre at a time when France was economically challenged and experiencing a return to religious piety.

Often combining oral folklore and entirely new pieces, the contes de fées were the product of a fertile creativity from women who “invented a tradition with their own fairy tales” (15). Seifert and Stanton emphasize that this newly created literary production included elements of refined and privileged comportment belonging to an elite society, thus distinguishing the conteuses’ tales from the popular and lowly milieu.

Based on the marvelous, the contes also incorporate references to the upper-class society, such as theater, opera, and contemporary mores, thereby positioning the contes de fées as a modern genre. Indeed, the editors detail the context in which the seventeenth-century tales were created at the peak of the quarrel of the Ancients and the Moderns. Far from being a recycled genre, the fairy tales were the voice of the conteuses affirming their belonging to a male-dominated society and their empowerment by means of their female characters, who were often active and in charge of their destiny. Noting that the conteuses called themselves modern fairies, Seifert and Stanton affirm that these “tales are both about and by fairies” (27). Through their leading female characters, the conteuses present alternatives and options for women in love, marriage, and governance, for instance.

Seifert and Stanton conclude their detailed introduction with a section on the reception of the fairy tales. A few critics have commented on the vogue of this new literary genre led by women writers and their use of unrealistic elements in their stories. The editors inform us that Jean-Baptiste Morvan de Bellegarde, Pierre-Valentin Faydit, and Abbé de Villiers were the main critics of the conteuses at the time. Interestingly, we learn that the Grimm Brothers in the nineteenth century were also fierce critics of d’Aulnoy and Murat in particular, favoring Perrault for his succinct writing style. Finally, the editors supply a list of key twentieth-century critical...