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Thesis

French

ID: <

10670/1.tc7fzl

>

Where these data come from
Paul Adam. The writer, the literature, the gender

Abstract

This thesis analyzes the literary work and career of a French symbolist novelist : Paul Adam (1862-1920).Born in the North of France, Paul Adam goes to Paris like many other writers of the “fin-de-siècle” in order to begin a writing career. The different strategies he adopts to become a leading author reveal the organization of the literary field becoming at that time more and more autonomous from the political power. These strategies convey the typical message of the young symbolist novelists and express the authors’ will to give literature a new kind of authority. The tools of the sociology of literature, used to describe this path, introduce and throw light on the study of the literary work by articulating it with its production and reception conditions.The literary analysis shows that in Paul Adam’s work, the novelistic form is an integral part of an idea of the world inherited from kabbalistic doctrines which assert that the universe is divided into two distinct poles : masculine and feminine. Gender, meaning social representations of sex, is the basis for the analysis of the author's novels, and, in this purpose, is closely linked with literary genre. Paul Adam’s involvement in political and social issues of his time lead him to wonder about the gender identities of his characters, and the relationships with the power resulting of them.However, the constant and close link between the masculine imaginary of the “fin-de-siècle”,the kabbalistic doctrines and the political changes lead to many contradictions in gender representations in the novels.The considerable changes of mind in Paul Adam’s writings and political commitments show that the literary form is inextricably linked to his particular and changing view of gender representations.Finally, the evolution of this rich and complex thought expressed in an extremely prolific and varied literary work, can be explained by the desire of recognition that Paul Adam nourished throughout his career.

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