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The fantastic genre holds a privileged position in literary and feminist studies because of its open exploration of the limits of mimetic creation and its attempts to represent alterity, both feminine and supernatural. This study traces its development as a product of the dramatically changing cultural context of nineteenth-century France. Examining post-revolutionary concerns about questions of gender and identity, this work observes the increasingly disruptive force of the feminine fantastic upon the masculine subject/author as symptomatic of a crisis underlying dominant attitudes toward material progress, which culminated in the death of the representational in the early twentieth century.

"The language of the fantastic left its mark upon many different thinkers in 19th-century Europe. Marx's comparison of consumer goods to fetish objects, works by Villiers de l'Isle-Adam or other novelists about machines that assume lives of their own, or the diagnoses of psychological illness offered by doctors in Maupassant's tales all blur the lines between scientific description and beliefs in the magical. Building upon a wealth of critical studies devoted to the fantastic and upon Freud's theory of the unconscious, Jutta Fortin proposes that many classic stories of the fantastic undermine basic psychological mechanisms that are designed to help their users cope with shocking or disturbing events. By defining five of these defence mechanisms, and analyzing stories by eight writers that both illustrate and subvert such mechanisms, Dr. Fortin offers reasons why fantastic stories appealed to those readers who wished to better understand human motivations."--BOOK JACKET.

Set in the Paris of society women, prostitutes and small-minded bourgeousie, and the isolated villages of rural Normandy that de Maupassant knew as a child, the thirty-three tales in this volume are among the most darkly humorous and brilliant short stories in nineteenth-century literature. They focus on the relationships between men and women, as in the poignant fantasy of 'A Parisian Affair', between brothers and sisters, and between masters and servants. Through these relationships, Maupassant explores the dualistic nature of the human character and his stories reveal both nobility, civility and generosity, and, in stories such as 'At Sea' and 'Boule de Suif', vanity, greed and hypocrisy. Maupassant's stories repeatedly lay humanity bare with deft wit and devastating honesty.

The most celebrated French storyteller of the nineteenth century, Guy de Maupassant was a master of the modern short story. Offering an intriguing picture of French life, his stories derive their enduring appeal from understated artistry, extreme craftsmanship, and the universality of his characters and their aspirations and misfortunes. His career as a professional writer lasted only twelve years before it was brutally cut short by the dreadful consequences of untreatable syphilis: chronic sickness, a failed suicide attempt, insanity, paralysis, and death after eighteen months’ confinement in a clinic. In this insightful and compelling biography, the only one in English currently available, Christopher Lloyd situates Maupassant’s life and work in the literary and social context of nineteenth-century France. He skillfully introduces the reader to Maupassant’s most famous works, such as Boule de suif, Bel-Ami, and Pierre et Jean, as well as highlights the important stages and achievements of his life and legacy.