© 2003 by Society for French Studies
Writing to Paris: Poets, Nobles and Savages in Nineteenth-Century Brittany
1 University of Wales, Aberystwyth
In this article, representations of Brittany in nineteenth-century French-language literature are studied in order to investigate the way in which cultural cross-currents can be observed in the detail of the text. A lexical approach shows how writers have re-worked motifs and clichés about Brittany (particular attention is paid to the lexical field of ‘sauvage’), and to how writers' precise choice of words can reveal the complexity of the relationship between the regional writer and the literary life of the capital. Auguste Brizeux's collection of poetry Marie (1831) is identified as marking the emergence of a tradition of Breton writing of French expression. However, the success of this work is attributed to the way in which it is ‘written to Paris’; that is, written with close regard for the fashions and tastes of the capital.