Théâtre de femmes de l'Ancien Régime, XVIe siècle ed. by Aurore Evain, Perry Gethner and Henriette Goldwyn (review)

Book Reviews121 Reviews pre-Revolutionary French Literature Evain, Aurore, Perry Gethner et Henriette Goldwyn, eds. Théâtre defemmes de l'Ancien Régime, XVf siècle. Saint-Etienne : Publications de l'Université de Saint-Etienne, 2006. Pp 562. ISBN: 2-86272^24-6. 10 € (Paper). Théâtre desfemmes de l'Ancien Régime, XVF siècle is the first in a series of five volumes dedicated to the works of French women playwrights from the sixteenth to the eighteenth century. The first volume contains thirteen plays by three sixteenth-century authors: Marguerite de Navarre, Louise Labé and Catherine Des Roches. In an informative and well-researched twenty-eight page introduction to the volume, Aurore Evain first outlines the goal of this ambitious project: to publish about fifty plays by some thirty authors from the first known French woman playwright, Marguerite de Navarre in the 1630s to the innovative works of Mme de Staël-Holstein during the Enlightenment. The volumes will include plays of all genres from the religious plays of Marguerite de Navarre to pedagogical theater by Mme de Genlis and the revolutionary political plays of Olympe de Gouges. Nearly all the plays have been performed, whether in private venues or professional theaters, and almost half were staged at the Comédie Française or the Comédie Italienne. Evain then analyses the obstacles that women playwrights faced during the Ancien Régime as they tried to penetrate the masculine ?laceforte of the theater and the way literary history virtually erased their productions from the collective memory until the late twentieth century. Only then did literary researchers begin to excavate the archives to rediscover the rich repertoire of French women's theater like the plays published in these volumes. Finally, Evain provides an insightful introduction to the three authors whose works are published in this volume, focusing both on historical context and literary production. In addition to the excellent introduction to the volume as a whole, the anthology provides more specific information about the authors and their plays in each section, as well as a selected bibliography, and a glossary of sixteenth-century vocabulary found in the plays. Much has already been written about Marguerite de Navare, but little about her work as a playwright although, as Evain points out, she was one ofthe most prolific playwrights of her time with eleven plays of a variety of genres from farces to biblical dramas. Writing as a Protestant during the Reformation, Marguerite de Navarre's plays often reflect her religious and political engagement. Others bring to the stage critical reflections on love and marriage. This volume reproduces a selection of seven plays by Marguerite de Navarre: three religious satires, two divertissements, two lyrical meditations, and four biblical plays. 122Women in French Studies The anthology then takes us from the stronghold of the Reformation in southwestern France to the heart of humanism in sixteenth-century Lyon with Louise Labé's Débat de lafolie et de l'amour, a theatrical dialogue inspired by the theatrical innovations brought to France from Italy during this period. According to Evain, the play is both humorous and impertinent, as Labé couches biting critiques of the judicial system and the aristocracy behind an apparent bonhomie. More original, for Evain, is Labé criticism of the arbitrary nature of social inequality and the effects of male domination, and her affirmation of the absolute equality ofthe sexes. Catherine Des Roches, along with her mother Madeleine, held a prestigious literary salon during the 1570s in Poitiers which, like Lyon, had become a cultural center during the Renaissance. Four of her dramatic works are reproduced in this volume. Tobie is a tragi-comedy based on a passage from the Bible. However, Evain posits that the author was less interested in religious content of the play than its feminist message: of Sarra's eight husbands, only the last is not killed by an evil spirit because he was the only one who respected his wife. The second play, Bergerie, is a light pastoral comedy and final two plays, Placide et Sévère and Iris et Pasithée are short pedagogical dialogues on the subject ofwomen's education. Théâtre desfemmes de...