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Mademoiselle de Maupin

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I am sixty years old, and although Gautier became one of my favorite writers when I was around eighteen years old, I never got around to reading his masterpiece until now. The long preface of this novel is more famous than the novel itself, but let us talk about the novel. It is not clear just when the action takes place, somewhere between 1650 and 1835, but it doesn't really take place in a particular period, nor does it take place in the real world. It is a sort of fantasy in spite of not having any supernatural elements. It is based in part on Shakespeare's As You Like It, with Rosalind and Orlando being replaced by Maupin and D'Albert. It is somewhat confusing, as the author switches viewpoints from chapter to chapter without warning. Sometimes it is Maupin speaking, sometimes D'Albert, sometimes the author. Gautier worshipped the beauty of the physical and artistic worlds, which is the whole point of the novel. He tends to identify beauty with female beauty, but there are also swans and roses and nightingales and the moon and so much else. It is the most romantic novel ever written. Some readers may be annoyed by Gautier's penchant for description. In one passage, he takes two whole pages just to describe an old tapestry which has nothing to do with the plot. One needs some footnotes if one is not perfectly familiar with all of the learned references that are scattered throughout the novel. In one passage, Gautier mentions a seraglio and a handkerchief being dropped. This refers to the habit of the Turkish sultan of going to his seraglio or harem and dropping a handkerchief in front of the bed partner he has chosen for the night. But Gautier assumes that the reader knows about this and doesn't explain it. There is a lot of what might be called pseudo-homosexuality in the novel, men and women falling in love with women who are disguised as men, only to find out in the end their true sexual identity. The anguish of D'Albert upon thinking that he is in love with a man reads awfully silly to modern audiences that find nothing wrong with this. But it turns out that everybody in the novel is really heterosexual. There is a sex scene at the end, but this novel is far from being pornographic. It used to have a reputation of being a Dirty French Novel, but faded from popularity in the United States after real pornography made people realize how tame Gautier is in comparison. He seems to have been more interested in art than life. He can think of nothing better to compare a beautiful woman to than a statue or painting of a woman. There is not the slightest vulgarity or lapse of taste anywhere in the novel. Some passages are breathtaking. It is a shame that this novel failed to catch fire when Joanna Richardson translated it for Penguin Classics in the early 1980s. It had previously been in Random House's Modern Library series with a dust jacket showing two pairs of shoes, one male and one female, left outside a hotel room door to be cleaned. Gautier's humor is dry and charming. I love this book, but don't expect to find hordes buying it. It is for the few.

One of the great, tho surprisingly little known, classics of french lit. I don't believe it's ever been filmed and it would make such a wonderfully modern comedy of manners and sexual politics. Written in the 19th century and surprisingly nouveau. It is possibly my own personal favorite novel, I have several editions and have read it many times. A woman masquerades as a man, in the grand, Shakespearean classic tradition and finds herself drawn to both men and women as they to her. Much homosexual panic and confusion ensues, esp. for the man who finds this intriguing young 'boy' so fascinating. His lover, an older woman, is equally attracted to the disguised girl. Where will it all end? The french invented the menage afterall. Intricately written with lots of social satire and commentary. An interesting footnote: this is the book that Mary is reading in "The Children's Hr." that 'inspires' her imagination which leads to her ratting out her teachers as lesbians.

This book is an unequivocal celebration of Beauty--not the sentimental, middle-class idea of beauty, but the all-encompassing beauty to which the Aesthetic writers were enslaved. The prologue sets forth Gautier's cult of pure aesthetics, and the book is a fulfillment of every sublime principle delineated in the prologue.

The plot is relatively simple: Magdalene is a woman who is discontented with the traditional role of a woman, so she dresses as a man and ventures forth as "Theodore." An aesthete, D'albert, falls in love with her despite her male persona, and Magdalene in turn falls in love with his mistress Rosette. But it is much more complex than that. It is a meditation on the nature of the muse, on the subject-object relations in art, on the implications of gender politics, on the eternal Aesthetic in both life and art.

In this novel a young woman, Mademoiselle de Maupin, dresses as a man to find out what men are all about before she becomes committed to one in marriage. Not surprisingly it creates confusions for her. But, just to think of such a thing suggests some strange sexual chracteristics. What she finds out about men is not at all flattering. But the book is even-handed with some caustic comments about women also. Maupin rescues a girl about to become entrapped by one of the most unlikeable specimens of malehood. But how can she (still appearing to be a man) take under her wing a girl to care for her?

Gautier starts the book with a series of letters describing the confusion in the life of a young man, D'Albert. D'Albert takes a mistress, Rosette, because he is distressed about his own lack of fulfilment (what's wrong with him we may wonder?). But the mistress happens to have been disappointed in love because she had fallen in love with Maupin (apparently a man) who had to reject that love because .....

D'Albert has a fulfilling relationship with Rosette but someohow it is not satisfying. When Maupin returns - perhaps feeling guilty over how she had abandoned Rosette, perhaps even wanting to explain - D'Albert is captivated. He fears he must be homosexual, with all the horror or shock that entails as a realisation at the first instance. Perhaps we do accept homosexuality more readily these days, but it must still come as something of a shock to an individual. To me even the realisation of heterosexuality was something of a shock and I could only get used to the idea by thinking of biology and the 'normalness' of sex (why is it so hidden I wondered - and still do).

But D'Albert is profoundly heterosexual in his love for Maupin even though she still appears to be a man. The consummation of their love is both rewarding and disappointing to D'Albert. And in the end Gautier implies things about Maupin - and even Rosette - that are less clear.

This is a wonderful, evocative novel; erotic and sensual. Perhaps the plot stretches credibility a bit - if D'Albert had been a less unsettled man himself ..... But it doesn't matter if you are male or female, prepare yourself for some sharp observations on the behaviour of your own sex.

other recommendations:
'Indiana' - George Sand
'The Secret Power of Beauty' - John Armstrong
'Diaries' - Alma Schindler (Mahler-Werfel)

Gautier is great, and this story is his greatest. But Duncker's introduction in this Penguin edition should be noted, too. It offers insightful comments about various plot elements and about what Gautier's original audience already knew about Mademoiselle de Maupin before they even read the book. (This intro. can be read in its entirety by choosing to sample this edition.) The only other readily available version of "M de M" that I am aware of is a poorly scanned public domain version integrated into a Gautier set. This Penguin version is fairly priced for such high quality.

First things first: before every show we now have health and safety housekeeping : fire exits to the left...no, OK. But why, apropos of nothing, is Mademoiselle de Maupin, on `her' own, £10 on Kindle, free if in French and 80 p for 20 of Gautier's works which includes said piece in English? I don't know whether to write a review of the book or the twisted economics that drive the marketplace...not to mention I am positive there are at least 10 EU laws being broken right here right now.

Well, grumble grumble toil and trouble Mme de Maupin it is. Actually, if we're going to invoke any sort of Shakespeare, its not a distorted Macbeth that plays to the centrefold: its `as you like it', which G doesn't even try to hide: Maupin is referred to as Rosalind, just in case `the gentle reader' (ooh, I do so love being called that) (continuously through out the novel: this is a perfect example of customer is king: current authors: take note. Pamper us readers!) just in case, I was saying, I had somehow miraculously missed the point and actually imagined for a moment that there was any actual gender-bender hanky panky going on here: if there is to be any plunging of a purple headed warrior into a perfect mound love pudding (oh gentle reader do your own google here) then it is decidedly Rosalind and not Theodore's pudding that is being stirred!

And this is the trouble with 19c story troubadours: lets be risqué, but lets not be risqué. Obviously, with homosexuality deemed a criminal offence way back when, and authors having to sub their own publications, one can't get TOO frisky or you just get hoisted on your own petard. Now, the sublime, gorgeous irony here is that nothing, and I mean nothing G lays out in this novel even compares (Sinead, background vocals here please) to the real deal: G wasn't taking the trouble to invent La Maupin: he was shamelessly plagiarising the life of the real La Maupin: shamelessly, because instead of embellishing, he had to tone it down. (today, we do just the opposite to get our ratings).

Yes, there was a La Maupin. What can I say about her, except that I wish she was me, or that I was her, or some such blending of lives. Here she is in all her glory:

[...]

Admirable woman. What would YOU do, if a Frenchman, said to you ` Tell me oh pretty bird, I've listened to your chirping, now tell me of your plumage?', just because you were a cross dressing femme fatale? Well, she lanced him with her sword, nursed him back to health and had a passionate affair with him. Sigh. (next up, Eleonora's Cave editions for me, just to cleanse the palate). (hrm, and the frog in my throat).

One last thing: a gripe, an helpless howl in the face of reality: what is the matter with men anyhow? G goes on for ages, pages, chapters, soliloquies and asides to hammer home the point that all he wants out of a woman is physical perfection, that nothing else matters. Not brains, nor wit, not vivacity: just show him the .....(fill in your own blank). Can this be right?