Hemingway (2)

In class, we have touched upon the role of the Woman -- specifically, the wife -- in both Noa Noa and A Moveable Feast.  In Hemingway's memoir, we have the sense that he is accepted into the folds of the insular, inclusionary expatriate community.  He navigates within the network of writers and artists (British and American), and travels within/without France with remarkable mobility.  To a striking extent, "the wives" are characterized in altogether different terms.  Hadley infers that she is invisible and muzzled, and Zelda's "insanity" may in fact result from her neglect and isolation.  Reflect upon the ways in which the figure of the American in Paris is gendered in Hemingway's text: does *everyone* thrive, as it were, in Paris?  

Hemingway

In our discussions of Maupassant, we insisted on the notions of drifting and of being "afloat."  Relate these to Hemingway's idea of a *moveable* "feast."  

Consider the notion of drifting in Maupassant's Afloat.  You might think of narrative structure, geographical/imagined space, the journey, relationship to self, etc.  Please point to specific passages as you elaborate your reflections.

This will be the basis of your reflection question, to be prepared (to be presented and/or submitted) for class Monday.

Synthesis (1)

While Montaigne, Montesquieu and Mercier write seemingly very different "travel narratives," there nonetheless remain striking similarities -- if not in the form, then in the thematic preoccupations -- between their works. Reflect upon the commonalities between the Essays, the Persian Letters, and the Tableau de Paris. In the final analysis, are these texts more similar than not? Does (apparently different) form attempt to achieve a similar end? What it, for you, the most important feature that these texts share? Please be specific in your synthesis.

Montesquieu, _Persian Letters_ (2)

To a great extent, our discussions of the Persian Letters have revolved around the form of the novel; that is to say, we have related questions of interest to the nature and form of the letter.  We have considered the importance of perspective and point of view as inherently plural in the epistolary form, and suggested that both perception and knowledge are to be understood -- by extension -- as plural.  Let us now think more explicitly about the relationship between the letter and power.

Who writes, and why?  What is the relationship between the letter, the act of writing, the act of reading, and visibility?  Whose narrative is authoritative?  Whose is discounted?  Who speaks/writes on another's behalf?  Why and when?  You might relate the question of power to that of knowledge.

Thinking in a larger context, now, reflect upon the *kind* of power exercised in "narrating" the Other.  

Please provide specific page numbers when making reference to the text, and point to at least one particular passage.

Montesquieu, _Persian Letters_ (1)

In our discussions of Montaigne's Essays, we considered the form and genre of the text (essay) as mirroring the author's project of discovery (self-discovery, discovery of the New World).  Montesequieu adopts the conventions of a different genre -- that of the epistolary novel.  What is the significance of the letter in the Persian Letters?  What does the letter do, communicate, perform, signify (...)?  You might consider the notions of movement, distance, alterity, authorship, spectatorship, contact.