FRENCH 17

ASSAF, FRANCIS. “L’Hiver de 1709.” CdDS 12.2 (2009): 1—29.

Assaf examines different reactions to the winter calamities, which affected not only France but most of Europe in 1709. Particular emphasis is placed on testimonies by Voltaire and Saint-Simon. The latter, in particular, harshly criticized the egotism and malpractices that went hand in hand with the devastating economic breakdown. The tragic consequences of the winter storms also serve Saint-Simon to criticize political mischief, i.e., the royal fiscal policy. This essay then discusses in great length the international dimension of the damages done by the cold winter.

BALVAY, ARNAUD. L’épée et la plume. Amérindiens et soldats des troupes de la marine en Louisiane et au Pays d’en Haut (1683—1763). Québec : Les Presses de l’Université Laval, 2006.

Review : J. A. Dickinson in UTQ, 78.1 (Winter 2009), 624—627 : “Ce livre s’intéresse aux forts, aussi bien dans les Pays d’en Haut qu’en Louisiane à l’époque du déploiement des troupes de la marine par l’administration coloniale française, soit une période relativement courte de 1683 à 1760. [. . .] Le livre se divise en trois parties : la politique impériale française et le rôle des forts dans le maintien des alliances avec les autochtones ; la manière d’aborder l’altérité et de tisser des liens par la guerre, la diplomatie et le métissage ; enfin, la société des forts. [. . .] En fin de compte, ce travail déçoit et le questionnement initial. . . n’est que partiellement démontré. Il y a trop de digressions ‘hors sujet’. . . On regrette aussi que l’approche ne soit pas systématique et précise. . .Le résultat est peu convaincant. . .”

BARIDON, MICHEL. A history of the gardens of Versailles. trans. Adrienne Mason. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2008.

Review: A. Widder in CHOICE 46 (2009), 1300—01: A scholarly history of the gardens from Louis XIV to Louis XVI, based on original sources. “The approach is chronological and emphasizes the political, intellectual, artistic, and scientific ideas behind the park’s developments” (1300). Provides little information on specific plants, etc., in the gardens. Reviewer laments the book’s minimal illustrations but recommends the work overall. The review itself contains useful bibliographic supplements to Baridon’s work.

BECKER, KARIN etOLIVIER LEPLATRE,dir. Ecritures du repas. Fragments d’un discours gastronomique. Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang, 2007.

Review: G. Bosco in S Fr 155 (2008): 506—507. Organized as a voyage through European culture “des mots et des mets,” B. and L.’s edited collection focuses on both “littérature pragmatique” and “belles-lettres.” After a multidimensional theoretical section, the essays follow a chronological order from the Middle Ages to the 20th century. 17th C scholars will appreciate Jean-Pierre Landry’s textual analysis of Molière’s first and last comedies and Marine Ricord’s examination of nourishment, literal and metaphorical, in Mme de Sévigné.

BETTENCOURT, FRANCISCO and FLORIKE EGMOND, eds. Correspondence and Cultural Exchange in Europe, 1400—1700. Cambridge: CUP, 2007.

Review: J. Papy in RBPH 86.2 (2008), 521—523: “A third volume, resulting from a prestigious research programme sponsored by the European Science Foundation, Cultural Exchange in Europe, 1400—1700, has but rightly been devoted to the central importance of epistolary exchange as a means of cultural exchange. Article by Peter Mason “endeavoured to combine the reading of Nicolas Poussin’s painting Israelites Gathering the Manna and his letter to Paul Fréart de Chantelou (dated April 1639). In a similar line of thought Mason analyses Poussin’s last, yet never completed Apollo and Daphne (1665): in an amazing way letter writing and painting went hand in hand again.”

BIGLIAZZI, SILVIA and SHARON WOOD, eds. Collaboration in the Arts from the Middle Ages to the Present. Aldershot: Ashgate, 2006.

Review: Anon. in FMLS 44.1 (2008): 91. “Collaboration” is illustrated both positively and negatively in this rich and wide-ranging collection of studies which also serves as a “useful reminder about the alleged indeterminacy of meanings and the positive weight of critical collaborations to combat political correctness” (91).

BIRBERICK, ANNE L. and RUSSELL GANIM, eds. Modern Perspectives on the Early Modern: Temps recherché, temps retrouvé. Charlottesville: Rookwood Press (EMF: Studies in Early Modern France, 10), 2005.

Review: Anon. in FMLS 44.1 (2008): 94. Praiseworthy for its ambition along with its coherence and high quality, this edition of nine essays explores theory, influence, representation, rhetoric—in sum, “different facets of a wide-ranging topic, namely reflections on the Renaissance and seventeenth-century culture in modern (and post-modern) literature, art and critical thinking” (94). A bibliography accompanies each article and there is an index to the whole.

BJØRNSTAD, HALL. “ « Plus d’éclaircissement touchant la grande galerie de Versailles » : du nouveau sur les inscriptions latines.” DSS 243 (2009), 321—343.

In light of the recent restoration work at Versailles, the author revisits the reading and interpretation of the Latin inscriptions found in the Galerie des Glaces.

BRAUN, GUIDO and SUSANNE LACHENICHT, eds. Hugenotten und deutsche Territorialstaaten. Immigrationspolitik und Integrationsprozesse. Les États allemands et les huguenots. Politique d’immigration et processus d’intégration. Pariser Historische Studien, Bd. 82. München: Oldenbourg, 2007.

Review: P. Fuchs in HZ 286.3 (2008): 724—726. This collection of 8 French and 7 German essays results from the October 7, 2005 Colloque which took place at the German Historical Institute in Paris. Concentrating on the plight of the Huguenots who fled France after Louis XIV’s Revocation of the Edict of Nantes, and focusing on the German states and the process of integration, the essays take up subjects such as linguistic acculturation, identity, mémoires of the refugees, and the Huguenots as artisans of the Enlightenment. Myriam Yardeni, “die grande dame der Hugenotten Forschung” (12) is responsible for the summing up of the volume’s contributions.

BRAZEAU, BRIAN. “Nos Ancêtres les Américains: Myth and Origins in Early New France.” CdDS 12.1 (2008): 1—15.

The article centers its discussion on the important question of francisation, leading to a reflection on what the term “français” implied. The author is particularly interested in the type of francisation before official policy, and he analyzes seventeenth-century reflections on identity through the work of Marc Lescarbot’s Histoire de la Nouvelle-France. He concludes that Lescarbot’s France finds itself transformed by the writer’s attempted francisation of America.

BREEN, MICHAEL P. Law, City, and King: Legal Culture, Municipal Politics, and State Formation in Early Modern Dijon. Rochester, NY: U of Rochester P, 2007.

Review: O. Ranum in Ren Q 61.2 (2008): 559—561. Acclaimed as “the first really successful political-culture study known to this reviewer,” B.’s synthesis is well-documented by manuscript and printed sources and demonstrates “a thoughtful understanding of recent work” on the subject (559). B.’s discerning examination involves qualities or themes such as “self, honor, and dignity,” “social relations,” “secular civic consciousness,” “corporations,” “attitudes toward the political,” the late 17th C “intellectually-rich legal culture,” and “symbol-laden detail” such as the arches and inscriptions of entrées (560—561). The astute, erudite reviewer offers a few questions for future study and further refinement of the subject.

BRIGGS, ROBIN. The Witches of Lorraine. Oxford: Oxford UP, 2007.

Review: J. Black in JES 38 (2008): 321—22. An “important and scholarly study of early modern European witchcraft.” Records of trials offer opportunity to penetrate the world of villagers, who talk more about the routine aspects of their lives in witchcraft cases than about the supposed crime. The book places less emphasis on persecution of witches than on witchcraft as a “regular part of social relations.” Even in Lorraine, where persecution was intense, most people dealt with witchcraft by informal means, such as “religious rituals, counter-magic, local negotiations, and personal violence.” An important book for scholars of witchcraft, of the Reformation and of the Counter-Reformation.

Review: S. Clark in TLS 5503 (Sept 19, 2008): 24—25. Briggs has used the Ducal archives at Nancy to reinsert “the figure of the witch into the dynamics of small peasant and farming communities and their often murderous relationships and rivalries.” Trial records show that responsibility for alleged acts of witchcraft was “a matter of inference rather than a specific assertion.” Witnesses therefore offered “detailed accounts of the often subtle inflections in their relationships and interactions with their neighbours, sometimes stretching back many years.” Accusations depended on interpreting nuances of speech, and “Language is at the heart of Briggs’s analysis.” The extent to which witches were “managed,” as part of the fabric of village life, rather than persecuted is striking. Reviewer praises companion website, which offers English summaries of nearly 400 witch trials from Lorraine and lengthy excerpts in French from those transcripts.

BURGUIÈRE, ANDRÉ. L’École des Annales. Une histoire intellectuelle. Paris: Odile Jacob, 2006.

Review: O.G. Oexle in HZ 286.2 (2008): 435—436. Welcome monograph by the “Directeur d’études an der ‘École des hautes études en sciences sociales’” (435). This concise and fluid volume examines France’s identity and cultural value as well as the country’s history and the science of history from Annales perspectives. Overarching theme is the development from the 1930s history of mentalities to the 1970s and 1980s anthropological “era.” Although the reviewer says nothing specific about the 17th C, specialists will want to be aware of this important study.

BURKE, PETER. Popular Culture in Early Modern Europe. Third edition. Aldershot, U.K.: Ashgate, 2009.

Review: E. Scott-Baumann in TLS 5553 (Sept 4 2009): 27. In a new introduction, Burke defends his original approach and explores the problems posed by the key words popular and culture. “Burke’s is still an erudite and stimulating guide to pre-industrial European culture after thirty years of lively work in the field.”

CALABI, DONATELLA and STEPHEN TURK CHRISTENSEN, eds. Cities and Cultural Exchange in Europe, 1400—1700. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 2007.

Review: E. Dursteler in Ren Q 61.3 (2008): 947—950: Multifaceted volume addresses both conceptual issues and representative case studies. Europe and the Mediterranean are the geographical focus of the authors as they examine “spaces and structures of cultural exchange” (948) along with the place of foreigners in cities.

CAMPBELL, THOMAS P., ed. Tapestry in the Baroque: Threads of Splendor. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2007.

Review: J. C. Smith in Ren Q 61.3 (2008), 980—981. Highly praiseworthy collection edited by the present director of the Metropolitan Museum of Art includes articles on Parisian workshops of the first half of the 17th C and on the Gobelins weavers and royal workshops at Beauvais during Louis XIV’s reign. This catalogue of the exhibit Tapestry in the Baroque (New York and Madrid) is judged “stellar” and is geographically wide-ranging, embracing production and marketing in Brussels, Antwerp, London and Rome, among other important cities. In addition to “his knowledgeable contributors,” C. himself offers several essays of his own. Remarkable color plates.

CHARBONNEAU, FRÉDÉRIC. “ « Un si prodigieux amas de bienfaits tourné en poison » : félonie et démesure dans les Mémoires de Saint-Simon.” EF 45.2 (2009), 99—111.

Describes how the memorialist Saint-Simon used his writings as he tirelessly fought to have the rank of “prince étranger” abolished and the Bouillons put in what he perceived to be their rightful place.

CLARKE, DESMOND M. Descartes’s Theory of Mind. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 2005.

Review: Jorge Secada in PhQ 59 (April 2009), 359—362. Reviewed along with Clarke’s biography of Descartes. Secada notes that the books contain “much important material,” although he takes issue with a few of Clarke’s interpretations, which run afoul of historical context and at times Descartes’s own arguments.

CORNETTE, JOËL. Histoire de la Bretagne et des Bretons. Tome I. Des âges obscurs au règne de Louis XIV. Tome II. Des Lumières au XXIe siècle. Paris : Seuil, 2005.

Review : J.-M. Le Gal in QL 983 (du 1er au 15 janvier 2009), 22—23 : “L’organisation de cet exposé chronologique, proposant sur une aussi large perspective historique une récapitulation systématique des connaissances, s’appuie sur un mode spécifique d’investigation. En effet, en complément d’apports allant de l’archéologie à la linguistique et à côté des donnés relevant de l’histoire structurelle, il est fait bonne place à une source souvent reléguée au second plan par les historiens : les écrits de contemporains de l’action offrant l’éclairage d’un regard personnel et unique, ces documents privilégiés qui viennent ainsi ‘en contrepoint d’une histoire à dominante nécessairement événementielle.’” Le critique signale le témoignage de documents exceptionnels comme pour le XVIIe siècle, “l’étonnante Correspondance du marquis et de la marquise de La Moussaye (1619—1663).”

COWART, GEORGIA. The triumph of pleasure: Louis XIV and the politics of spectacle. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2008.

Review: V. Vaughan in CHOICE 47 (2009), 309—10. Discusses different phases of monarchal influence over opera-ballets. Progresses logically from Louis’ better-known moments of involvement to lesser-known instances during strained moments late in his reign. Also addresses the political nature of burlesque, self-referential satire, the shifting role of Italy and adaptations of the myth of Cythera. Recommended.

DEKONINCK, RALPH and AGNÈS GUIDERDONI-BRUSLÉ, eds. Emblemata sacra: Rhétorique et herméneutique du discours sacré dans la littérature en images. Imago Figurata Studies 7. Turnhout: Brepols, 2007.

Review: A. Saunders in Ren Q 61.3 (2008): 963—964: Judged “substantial” and “impressive” as the collection opens up “the broader spiritual context in which emblematic religious writings should be situated” (964). One of two important publications that have resulted from the 2005 conference on the topic at the Université Catholique de Louvain. Focus is on French works from the 17th C and Catholic spirituality; “discours sacré” includes both texts and images. The collection is organized into seven sections: “Questions d’histoire et de méthodes,” “Exégèse de l’Ecriture et de la Création,” “L’image in absentia,” “Rhétorique et poétique de l’image,” “Le spectacle de l’image,” “La circulation des images entre sensibilités religieuses,” and “L’efficace de l’image.” The essays are rich and varied, treating both well- and little-known subjects. Reviewer, who herself is a renowned specialist in the domain, regrets nevertheless the paucity of illustrations and lack of a bibliography.

DEMERS, PAUL A. “The French Colonial Legacy of the Canada-United States Border in Eastern North America, 1650—1783.” French Colonial History 10 (2009), 35—54.

Analyzes the territory disputes in the Northeast Americas in the 17th and 18th centuries, along with the process of border formation.

DIMLER, G. RICHARD. Studies in the Jesuit Emblem. AMS Studies in the Emblem 18. Brooklyn: AMS Press, 2007.

Review: W Melion in Ren Q 61.2 (2008): 584—586. Welcome volume “bears witness to this scholar’s foundational contributions to the field of emblematics” (586). Rhetorical form and function are the focus of these essays “selected from D.’s extensive writings on emblematic theory and practice” (584). Praiseworthy introduction provides “a comprehensive overview of scholarship on the Jesuit emblem” (585). Particularly impressive are chapters on Jakob Masen’s theory of the figurative image which although privileging the visual demonstrate the power of the symbolic as regards persuasion.

DOUSSET, CHRISTINE. “Femmes et héritage en France au XVIIe siècle.” DSS 244 (2009), 477—491.

The author provides a detailed historical analysis of the judicial status of women during the 17th C, concluding that “[l]a diversité juridique, les différences sociales, l’hétérogénéité des pratiques familiales dessinent dans la France du XVIIe siècle un paysage infiniment varié. La place des femmes dans les systèmes successoraux n’y apparaît pas de manière univoque et garde, dans l’état actuel des connaissances, de larges parts d’ombre. Face aux hommes, elles ne sont jamais totalement exclues de l’accès à la propriété ni des processus de transmission, mais elles restent très majoritairement sans doute à une place secondaire.”

EGMOND, FLORIKE and FRANCISCO BETHENCOURT, eds. Correspondence and Cultural Exchange in Europe, 1400—1700. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 2007.

Review: E. Dursteler in Ren Q 61.3 (2008): 947—950: Praiseworthy demonstration of a “much denser network of communications involving many smaller centers” than previous research had uncovered (948). Enlarges our understanding of communication, showing the engagement not only of the literate, political and the artistic, but also of the non-literary, even illiterate population.

EMICH, BIRGIT. Geschichte der Frühen Neuzeit studieren. Konstanz: Universitätsverlag Konstanz, 2006.

Review: S. Benz in HZ 286.2 (2008): 478—480. Wide-ranging volume is conceived particularly for students and is a helpful compendium of the “long” Renaissance. Praised for its lucid presentation of historical scholarship, complete with microhistory and discourse analysis, among others.

ERBEN, DIETRICH. Paris und Rom. Die staatlich gelenkten Kunstbeziehungen unter Ludwig XIV. Studien aus dem Warburg-Haus, Bd. 9. Berlin: Akademie, 2004.

Review: M. Hesse in HZ 286.3 (2008): 729—730. Although H. quibbles with an occasional tendency of E. toward panegyric and propaganda, he finds the volume a standard work on the political iconography of Louis XIV’s era. The well-known monuments, institutions and debates are contextualized in a convincing and stimulating manner (730). E. focuses on the numerous and essential Italian contributions to the systematic artistic policy such as the Escalier des Ambassadeurs in Versailles, the Académie and the Querelle des Anciens et des Modernes.

FIGEAC, MICHEL, ed. L’Ancienne France au quotidien: la vie et les choses sous l’Ancien Régime. Paris: Armand Colin, 2007.

Review: E. Ousselin in FR 82 (2009), 896—98: A dictionary with articles on material objects used during the Ancien Régime. “Centrés sur des objets ou des procédés matériels, la plupart des articles permettent d’éclairer sous un angle original des aspects sociaux de la France de l’Ancien Régime” (897). Contains useful bibliographic information. The reviewer would have enjoyed more illustrations, but nonetheless highly recommends the work.

FOLLAIN, ANTOINE. Le village sous l’Ancien Régime. Paris: Fayard, 2008.

Review: S. Surreaux in DSS 244 (2009), 562—564: Filling an enormous lacuna, this nuanced and detailed work represents “une somme sur l’histoire rurale française, au travers de sa composante essentielle, le village, et ce qui en fait son essence et sa force: la communauté villageoise. Cet ouvrage se compose de 12 chapitres, d’un index des noms des bourgs et des villages cités ainsi que de 12 pages de documents iconographiques.”

FRAGONARD, MARIE-MADELEINE and JACQUES BERCHTOLD, eds. La Mémoire des Guerres de religion: La concurrence des genres historiques (XVIe—XVIIIe siècles). Actes du Colloque international de Paris (15—16 novembre 2002). Cahiers d’Humanisme et Renaissance 79. Geneva: Droz, 2007.

Review: K. MacDonald in Ren Q 61.1 (2008): 202—204. This volume, which offers the acts of the first conference of the “Equipe Formes et idées de la Renaissance aux lumières,” fills a recognized lacuna in the criticism of the practice of history writing of the Wars of Religion. The 15 essays are chronologically arranged and explore a wide variety of genres from official histories and polemical pamphlets to memoires, letters, ballets, even the nouvelle, among others. The “personal documents” are shown to complement the “official,” as M. states: “The nouvelle showed what la grande Histoire was either unable or unwilling to” (203).

FRAPPIER, LOUISE. “Construction de la Figure monarchique et perfection divine dans les récits d’entrée royale à Avignon (1600 et 1622).” EMF 12 (2008): 26—43.

This article takes a closer look at the rhetorical devices that were used to describe the royal entrances in Avignon by Marie de Medici and Louis XIII. It shows how the image of the monarch’s divine character was not only constructed but even transformed, according to the political climate of the time. The ultimate construction is that of Louis XIII as image of God.

GALLO, DAVID M. “Royal Bodies, Royal Bedrooms: The Lever du Roy and Louis XIV’s Versailles.” CdDS 12.1 (2008): 99—118.

Starting with Norbert Elias’s The Court Society, the author discusses the general operation of power at the early modern court. He then turns to the lever in order to study the important development and shift in the public presentation of the French monarchy during Louis XIV’s latter reign and its implications for its future. He provides us with an in-depth study of the different stages and rituals in the lever du roi and its elaboration between 1663 and 1682. The essay concludes with the idea how the physical body of the king joined the immortal “mystical body” of the kings of France, now permanently visible and on display.

GARRAWAY, DORIS. The Libertine Colony: Creolization in the Early French Caribbean. Durham and London: Duke UP, 2005.

Review: Anon. in FMLS 44.1 (2008): 92. Welcome multidisciplinary analysis of cultural contacts based on “subtle and revealing literary interpretations of early modern histories, fictions, engravings, legal documents and travel writings.” The study, infused with methodology drawn from “historiography, anthropology and psychoanalysis,” will be useful to “students and specialists of the Early Modern period, colonial history, women’s studies and postcolonial studies” (92).

GIAVARINI, LAURENCE, éd. Construire l’exemplarité. Pratiques littéraires et discours historiens (XVIe — XVIIIe siècles). Dijon: Editions de l’Université de Dijon, 2008.

Review: J. Boucher in BHR 71.1 (2009), 183—85: “Ce volume collectif (13 articles) a une certain unité grâce à un avant-propos (L. Giavarini, pp. 7—25) ‘Étranges exemplarités’ et à une bibliographie pluridisciplinaire. À l’origine du colloque de Dijon (3—4 mars 2006), dont ce sont les Actes, il y avait eu l’intention d’offrir à des historiens et à des littéraires l’occasion de travailler sur l’exemple comme objet et méthode.”

GIBIAT, SAMUEL. Hiérarchies sociales et ennoblissement: les commissaires des guerres de la maison du roi, 1691—1790. Paris: École des Chartes, 2006.

Review: J. Laroche in FR 82 (2009), 1338—39: Describes the particular social ascent which was enjoyed by the king’s commissaires des guerres. This office was created so as give bourgeois who were devoted to Louis XIV a means to attain noble rank. Gibiat explores the extent to which early modern persons were attracted to these posts and what proved to be their long-term fate.

GOLDSTEIN, CLAIRE. Vaux and Versailles: The Appropriations, Erasures, and Accidents that Made Modern France. Philadelphia: U of Pennsylvania Press, 2007.

Review: A. Stedman in FR 82 (2009), 898—99: A compelling revision to received ideas about Louis XIV as the innovator of classicism. Goldstein “unearths the surprising, bourgeois origins of classicism’s aesthetic hegemony: Fouquet’s artistic court at Vaux-le-Vicomte” (898). By examining cultural works by canonical figures initially allied with Vaux, and then with Versailles, Goldstein establishes “French classiscism’s material and ideological debt to a salon-like circle of artistic collaboration—a society whose tenets of diversity, tolerance, generosity, refinement, discussion, and innovation fundamentally undercut the synonymous relationship between the French classical style and the absolutist political enterprise” (898).

Review: D. Grelé in SCN 66 (2008), 235—239: “Claire Goldstein examines the intersection of a particular aesthetic with the awareness of belonging to French culture and ultimately the feeling of being a subject of the king of France through the descriptive literature of Versailles and Vaux in the mid-Seventeenth Century. However, Professor Goldstein differentiates Vaux, the most accomplished model of a private residence, from Versailles, a less successful royal palace. Professor Goldstein elucidates the transformations in the social order through the study of Fouquet’s home and Louis XIV’s palace. Her book explores the state’s attempts to take control over the arts, and more specifically architecture, horticulture, pictorial arts and literature in order to serve its own ends.”

GONTHIER, URSULA HASKINS. “Une colonisation linguistique? Les Mémoires de l’Amérique septentrionale de Lahontan.” EF 45.2 (2009), 115—29.

Describes the 1703 memoirs of the Baron de Lahontan which include a “portrait ethnogéographique du Canada colonial” that, contrary to missionary accounts, shows the ways in which European and New World Cultures mixed and influenced each other.

GOODMAN, ELISE. The Cultivated Woman. Portraiture in Seventeenth-Century France. Tübingen: Gunter Narr, 2008.

Review: L. Rescia in S Fr 156 (2008): 659. Praiseworthy rich analyses of portraits collected from libraries and museums in Europe and America. Important work for the history of the genre, art history and for its interdisciplinary approach. Among the topics which receive focus are the education of women, the précieuses, and the production of Mme de Sévigné, Anne de La Vigne and Elisabeth Jacquet de la Guerre. G.’s study allows us a deeper understanding of la femme cultivée in its mythological and allegorical dimensions. Rich bibliography. Particularly accessible to an Anglophone public (and not only to specialists) due to the translations included.

HABIB, CLAUDE. Galanterie française. Paris: Gallimard, 2006.

Review: F. Pilone in S Fr 154 (2008): 241—242. Welcome consideration of the history of galanterie focuses on certain social institutions and personalities such as Louis XIII, Louis XIV, Cyrano and Rousseau. According to H., “per comprendere a pieno la galanterie bisogna passare attraverso la préciosité” (242). The section “L’âge galant: libertés, fictions” focuses essentially on feminine liberty.

HASQUIN, HERVÉ. Louis XIV face à l’Europe du Nord. L’absolutisme vaincu par les libertés. Bruxelles: Editions Racines, 2005.

Review: K. Malettke in HZ 286.2 (2008): 491—493. Instructive and stimulating manual of European history in the era of the Sun King includes economic, social and religious developments as well as artistic and cultural ones. Organized into the following sections: “L’Espagne sur le déclin,” “Comment Louis XIV a coalisé l’Europe du Nord contre la France, 1661—1697,” and “L’Angleterre arbitre, 1698—1715.” The study does not hesitate to present the negative side of Louis XIV and absolutism, for example, the repressive practice against the Huguenots which is called “le comble de la perversion” (n.p.). Useful maps, illustrations, tables, bibliography and index of names.

HELFFERICH, TRYNTJE, ed. and trans. The Thirty Years War: A Documentary History. Indianapolis: Hackett, 2009.

Review: L. Martines in TLS 5556 (Sept 25 2009): 12—13. A “remarkable collection of documents.” Reviewer does not specifically mention any documents of French origin, but says that book includes diaries and memoirs. This “learned eyewitness text is a superb companion for [Peter H.] Wilson’s magisterial history.”

HOGG, CHLOÉ. “Useful Wounds.” EMF 12 (2008): 1—25.

Hogg links the question of wounds to the question of state, of what she calls “pathological absolutism.” Although spectacles of noble injuries contributed to gloire, they both cover and deflect the king’s vulnerability and bind subjects to the mortal royal body. The essay concludes with the Hôtel Royal des Invalides, as a monument of “pathological absolutism” that “both requires and erases the invalid body.”

IBBETT, KATHERINE. “Productive Perfection: The Trope of the River in Early Modern Political Writing.” EMF 12 (2008): 44—57.

Ibbett looks at rhetorical devices, in particular the river imagery, in the political writings of French and Italian writers, namely Gabriel Naudé, Giovanni Botero and Jean Silhon. She discusses the relation between the discursive landscape, the figurative rivers that appear in political treatises, and the material landscape of real rivers to show their relation to the construction of political notions of the (“perfect”) state and how this imagery came to symbolize a vision of perfected classicism.

JAFFARY, NORA E., ed. Gender, Race and Religion in the Colonization of the Americas. Women and Gender in the Early Modern World. Aldershot: Ashgate, 2007.

Review: J. R. Ottman in Ren Q 61.2 (2008): 545—546. Welcome collection of eleven essays which “illustrate the kaleidoscopic variety of ways in which gender, race and religion interacted in the early modern Americas [rather] than to support the construction of any overarching synthesis” (545). Organized in thematic sections as follows: “Frontiers,” “Female Religious,” “Race Mixing,” and “Networks,” the essays are wide-ranging geographically and perspectives include the spiritual, the political and gender, among others. 17th C French scholars will appreciate Susan Broomhall’s examination of the chronicle of the Benedictine nuns in Tours and its minimization of ethnic differences.

JERVIS, SIMON SWYNFEN. “The Baroque exhibition in London.” Burlington 1275 (2009), 367—71.

Describes and critiques a recent exhibition at London’s Victoria and Albert Museum entitled “Baroque 1620—1800: Style in the Age of Magnificence.” Although some might dispute the category or the works or dates covered, the catalogue nonetheless may be of interest to dix-septiémistes, as it covers works of art from a variety of countries, including France.

LANZA, JANINE M. From Wives to Widows in Early Modern Paris: Gender, Economy, and the Law. Aldershot, England; Burlington, VT: Ashgate, 2007.

Review: M. Kaplan in FR 82 (2009), 1083—84: Suggests that widows of master craftsmen “broke away from a conception of gender as binary opposition and were able to occupy a spectrum of acceptable gendered roles” (9—10), that such women reconfigure our sense of the ‘family economy,’ and that they made strategic use of early modern law, rather than being passively governed by it. Very solidly researched; of interest to historians and literary scholars alike.

LEFFIZ, MICHEL. Jean Del Cour 1631—1707. Brussels: Editions Racine, 2007.

Review: Jennifer Montagu in Burlington 1268 (2008), 778. Biography and catalogue of over 200 sculptures by the man Montagu calls “the most famous sculptor of Baroque Liège.”

LEWIS, JOHN. Galileo in France: French Reactions to the Theories and Trial of Galileo. New York: Peter Lang, 2006.

Review: William L. Hine in Isis 100 (June 2009), 405—406. “A significant contribution to the study of Galileo’s influence in France,” characterized by “meticulous scholarship,” which analyzes the reactions not only of well-known figures such as Mersenne, Descartes, Peiresc and Gassendi, but also of minor figures, some of whom had studied with Galileo in Padua, who were concerned about his prosecution and tried to help.

LONG, KATHLEEN P. Hermaphrodites in Renaissance Europe. Women and Gender in the Early Modern World. Aldershot: Ashgate, 2006.

Review: G. S. Eschrich in Ren Q 61.2 (2008): 620—622. Judged “rich and revealing,” L.’s study analyzes a wide variety of documents from scientific treatises to novels and poetry. Chapters include examinations of the role of the hermaphrodite in alchemy, gendered representation and alchemical writings, the lyric hermaphrodite, portrayals of Henri III and his mignons and Thomas Artus’s novel Description de l’Isle des Hermaphrodites. Praiseworthy for its “helpful framework” and “significant contribution to gender studies” (622).

LYNN, JOHN A., II. Women, armies, and warfare in early modern Europe. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2008.

Review: J. Harrie in CHOICE 47 (2009), 190: Uses a wide range of sources to explore the role of women in European military campaigns from 1500 to 1815. Considers women who adopted male identities to fight, as well as prostitutes, wives and laundresses who were more diffusely involved in wars. Lynn highlights the years around 1650 as a turning point when women’s participation in military campaigns declined, a statistic he uses as a new way of indexing changes in state formation and state armies. Recommended.

MARTIN, MARGOT. “The Rhetoric of Mouvement and Passionate Expression in Seventeenth-Century French Harpischord Music.” SCFS, 31.2 (2009), 137—149.

Analyses how the rhetorical notion of mouvement, commonly identified in other art forms, can equally be found in early modern harpsichord music. Examines “how mouvement in harpsichord music was engendered by directing the physical / temporal motion of sound on many levels—tempo, meter, melody, rhythm, harmonic rate of change, use of agréments—, [thus] illustrating their participation in an intricate declamatory language used to create an expressive rhetorical discourse that reflected contemporary aesthetic values.”

MASON, CAROL I. and KATHLEEN L. EHRHARDT. “Iconographic (Jesuit) Rings in European/Native Exchange.” French Colonial History 10 (2009), 55—73.

Describes an archeological find in “New France,” namely Jesuit rings from the 17th and 18th centuries. Suggests that the process used to date these sites may need to be revamped.

MCCABE, INA BAGHDIANTZ. Orientalism in early modern France: Eurasian trade, exoticism, and the Ancien Régime. Oxford: Berg, 2008.

Review: F. Baumgartner in CHOICE 46 (2009), 2401: Suggests that Orientalism had a major impact on the economy and culture of early modern France. “The book’s narrative core is the reign of Louis XIV, who encouraged French overseas enterprises and at whose court the consumption of exotic luxury goods reached unprecedented levels.” An erudite book which can be of interest, however, “the author’s control of the facts of French history is often shaky” (2401).

Review: D. Visser in FR 82 (2009), 1337—38: Primarily concerned with the Ottoman Near East. Includes treatment of issues such as the “oriental” origins of French science, the “domestication” of exotic products such as coffee, tea and textiles, the loss of religious liberties by non-citizens and the failure of Colbert’s mercantilist policies. The reviewer laments the book’s poor editing but suggests that there is nonetheless much to recommend it.

MCCLELLAN, ANDREW, et al. Kings as Collectors: Paintings, Sculpture, and Decorative Arts from the Musée du Louvre. Atlanta: High Museum of Art, 2006.

Review: J. Gilroy in FR 82 (2008), 177—78: The catalogue of a travelling exhibit entitled “Artisans and Kings” held in Atlanta and Denver between 2006 and 2008. The exhibit addressed the relationship between the arts and the development of politics and society under Louis XIV, XV and XVI. The reviewer lends particular attention to McClellan’s introductory essay on Louis XVI-era projects for opening a public art museum in the Louvre.

MCCLURE, ELLEN. Sunspots and the Sun King: Sovereignty and Mediation in Seventeenth-Century France: Urbana and Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2006.

Review: C. Daniélou in FR 82 (2009), 1082—83: Suggests (through the example of Louis XIV) that the logic of divine right monarchy often fell into contradiction with its mythos. McClure presents the Sun King as “a divine right monarch caught between the choice of emphasizing his legitimacy and thereby losing himself or underlining his power and thereby obscuring the source of his authority” (85). Chapters on Louis’ memoirs, on diplomacy and its transfers of authority, and on the theater, develop this study of early modern political mediation. “Dense, méticuleux, admirable de précision” (1083).

MCHUGH, TIM. Hospital Politics in Seventeenth-Century France: The Crown, Urban Elites and the Poor. Aldershot & Burlington: Ashgate, 2007.

Review: S. Broomhill in SCN 66 (2008), 242—246: In this well reviewed book, “McHugh argues that the dominant historiography of early modern charity has seen in royal edicts the trace of an emerging strategy of crown control, often with little attention to the evidence of extant local records. His study will go some way towards showing the interpretive possibilities of remaining local evidence for offering a more complex narrative of early modern hospital politics.”

MERLIN-KAJMAN, HÉLÈNE. “Le texte comme don public.” EF 45.2 (2009), 47—67.

Discusses the role of works created specifically for artistic and literary patrons, the question of “stratégies sociales” as they related to these works and the relationship between writer and patron.

MOLHO, ANTHONY, DIOGO RAMADA CURTO, and NIKI KONIORDOS, eds. Finding Europe: Discourses on Margins, Communities, Images ca. 13th—ca. 18th Centuries. NY: Berghahn Books, 2007.

Review: E. D. English in Ren Q 61.3 (2008): 953—955: Praiseworthy for its varied exploration of discourses both positive and negative from the early modern era. Organized under three topics: “the drawing and policing of margins,” “the formations, disciplining and functioning of communities,” and “the modeling, transmission and circulation of specific images and practices” (954), the volume provides scholars with a better understanding of historical values. The essays, though not all-encompassing, are wide-ranging, from ethnographic studies to shared traditions and the ius commune, the idea of the museum and demonology, to name only a fraction of the themes.

MOLLENAUER, LYNN WOOD. Strange Revelations: Magic, Poison, and Sacrilege in Louis XIV’s France. University Park: Pennsylvania State UP, 2007.

Review: J. Prest in TLS 5504 (Sept 26, 2008): 12. A “book that is rich in detail and supporting anecdote.” Impressive array of sources, but Mollenauer “tends to treat them indiscriminately, as all equally able to support a point, and equally reliable.” “The book would have benefited from a more firmly articulated skepticism.” Mollenauer is more successful when analyzing the Affair in terms of gender and when comparing the formal hierarchy of the court with the shadow hierarchy which offered considerable power to the women in the king’s life. Author makes a strong case for why Mme de Montespan might have wanted to poison her rivals.

MOREAU, I. and G. HOLTZ, eds. “Parler librement.” La liberté de parole au tournant du XVIe et du XVIIe siècle. Lyon: ENS Editions, 2005.

Review: L. Rescia in S Fr 154 (2008): 178—179. These essays are the result of some journées d’étude organized by the ENS of Lyon from 2002—2003. Erudite libertinism is the subject of the volume which focuses on the pamphlet and strategies of dissimulation. The literary and historical dimensions are privileged in sections devoted to “auctoritas” and the ideological.

PETRY, CHRISTINE. “Faire des sujets du roi.” Rechtspolitik in Metz, Toul und Verdun unter französischer Herrschaft (1552—1648). Pariser Historische Studien. Bd. 73. München: Oldenbourg, 2006.

Review: M. Wrede in HZ 286.2 (2008): 487—489. Praiseworthy volume originated as a dissertation and traces the gradual process in the structuring of the French état royal of the three Lorraine cities (names in the title). Henri II is the protector of the cities while Louis XIV is the de facto souverain seigneur. Exemplary analysis of stages of the process, meaning and relationships between lords and rulers. An excellent reference.

POWELL, VÉRONIQUE GERARD. “Le Grand Siècle aux Gobelins.” RDM (février 2009), 169—72.

“Avec Alexandre et Louis XIV. Tissages de gloire, la galerie des Gobelins, rouverte en mai 2007 après des décennies de fermeture, rend homage à son royal fondateur, au talent extraordinaire du peintre du roi Charles Le Brun (1619—1690), son premier directeur, et au métier superbe de ses artisans.” Le catalogue de l’exposition (jusqu’au 1er mars 2009) est consacré à la pièce maîtresse, la tenture de l’Histoire d’Alexandre le Grand, “exposée pour la première fois depuis la révolution française dans la totalité de ses onze pièces de tapisserie . . .”

QUENET, GREGORY. Les tremblements de terre aux XVIIe et XVIIIe siècles: La naissance d’un risque. Seyssel: Champ Vallon, 2005.

Review: Kenneth L. Taylor in Isis 100 (March 2009), 164—165. Impressively researched, a “multidisciplinary exploration of the mentalities exhibited in relation to earthquakes.” Places seismic activity in the larger context of reaction to unforeseen catastrophe, and argues convincingly that earthquakes “are much more than physical processes and events; they are cultural elaborations upon them.”

ROLET, STÉPHANE, ed. L’Emblème littéraire: Théories et pratiques. Littérature 145. Paris: Larousse, 2007.

Review: D. Graham in Ren Q 61.1 (2008): 230—232. Despite inadequate proofreading (there are unfortunate misspellings and typos), this edited collection is judged a worthwhile contribution to the field. Varied subjects treated range from the conception and edition of emblem books, sources, emblem as propaganda, symbolism, along with case studies. Particularly noteworthy is Daniel Russell’s “Nouvelles directions dans l’étude de l’emblème français” which considers emblem not only as form but as “mode of thought and reading” (232).

ROODENBURG, HERMAN, ed. Forging European Identities, 1400—1700. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 2007.

Review: E. Dursteler in Ren Q 61.3 (2007): 947—950: Although the volume includes “many excellent essays” offering perspectives on subjects from ceramics to costume and dance, the introduction “fails to place the . . . essays into any intelligible dialogue with each other” (948—949). Furthermore, the focus is on art and material culture rather than, as the title suggests, the formation of identity.

SHOEMAKER, PETER W. Powerful Connections: The Poetics of Patronage in the Age of Louis XIII. Newark: U of Delaware P, 2007.

Review: L. Seifert in Ren Q 61.3 (2008): 898—899: Praiseworthy for providing a broad and “multifaceted account of both the rhetoric and the practice of literary patronage “during the early 17th C. Chapters focus on “ambiguities and paradoxes of the patron-client relationship,” Guez de Balzac’s letters as “an ideal of the autonomous self, “a poetic corpus drawn from Régnier, Sigogne and Malherbe illustrating “authorship shared with the patron,” libertine writers (St. Amant, Théophile, Sorel), the theatre (Corneille, Mairet, DuRyer) and others “sponsored by Richelieu,” and the Académie Française (S. sees the academy as “both a beneficiary of Richelieu’s patronage [and] an institutional patron”). Highly recommended for its valuable perspectives on authorship, the development of literary fields and the reading public.

Review: G. Turnovsky in SCN 66 (2008), 233—236: “Powerful Connections delivers an intricate and complete account of the intellectual culture of early seventeenth-century France, refracted through the history of an institution [patronage] that was absolutely central to this culture yet whose precise contribution to its development has not always been well defined. As the title suggests, Shoemaker’s study is especially strong when it builds its historical analysis on an incisive examination of the rhetoric that, in a way, is what really constituted patronage.”

SMITH, PAMELA H. and BENJAMIN SCHMIDT, eds. Making Knowledge in Early Modern Europe: Practices, Objects, and Texts, 1400—1800. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2007.

Review: H. Floris Cohen in Isis 100 (September 2009), 662—663. Stems from a conference intended to correct the bias in history writing towards textual material and to link the production of knowledge in early modern Europe with contemporary European historical phenomena. If one leaves aside the overly ambitious claims to scholarly innovation, which the reviewer finds a bit much, there are some very good papers (the reviewer names those on Solomon’s Temple, on efforts at botanical nomenclature, and on the Dutch literary adoption of novelty), although others, such as the piece on Boyle’s adoption of the essay form, “do not even meet elementary criteria of scholarly adequacy.” There are also some unfortunate oversights in the editing (misspellings, etc.)

SPAWFORTH, TONY. Versailles: A Biography of a Palace. New York: St. Martin’s Press, 2008.

Review: J. Rogister in TLS 5542 (June 19 2009): 10. A “useful biography of the palace over its 300 years of existence.” Discusses palace “as centre of government, a place for living, and a place of conspicuous consumption.” Shows awareness that at Versailles, “all was not right” from the start.

TAKEDA, JUNKO THÉRÈSE. “Levantines and Marseille: The Politics of Naturalization and Neutralization in Early Modern France, 1660—1720.” SCFS, 30.2 (2008), 170—181.

Article “examines the connections between fluctuations in French policies directed at Levantine migrations into the kingdom, and depictions of Ottoman Levantine peoples in French travel literature during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries.” Argues that the favorable portraits and emphasis on inclusiveness which mark the period 1660 to 1683 give way by the end of Colbert’s tenure to a discourse of exclusion, where the “Levantine other was depicted as a threat to French identity.”

TAPIÉ, ALAIN et al., eds. Philippe de Champaigne (1602—1674), entre politique et devotion. Paris: Réunion des musées nationaux, 2007.

Review: J. Rogister in TLS 5478 (March 28, 2008): 10. Catalogue of exhibition that took place in 2007. Vincent Carraud gives “revealing anaylsis of pictures.” “In celebrating a great and hitherto neglected painter, last year’s exhibition and the accompanying catalogue have drawn attention to the far-reaching spiritual and cultural aspect of jansensism.” Review itself provides helpful overview of Champaigne’s career.

TRUE, MICAH. “‘Il faut parler pour estre entendu.’ Talking about God in Wendat in 17th century New France.” CdDS 12.1 (2008): 80—36.

The author looks at the communication challenges facing the Jesuit priests in their missionary encounters with the Iroquoian and Algonquoian groups. He focuses on the strategies, linguistic inventions and compromises that made it possible for the Jesuits to embrace their message in front of the Amerindians. The article draws on the Jesuit Relations and six unpublished bilingual dictionaries, written by Jesuit missionaries.

TURREL, DENISE. “Les mariages de nuit: les rituels nuptiaux dans les villes du XVIIe siècle.” DSS 244 (2009), 523—533.

Using the records of Bourg and Pont-de-Vaux as historical examples, the author asks the question, “À quelle heure se mariait-on sous l’Ancien Régime? Cette question n’a jamais été étudiée de façon systématique. Or, bien que la mention de l’heure de la célébration ne soit pas obligatoire dans les registres paroissiaux, on la trouve assez souvent au XVIIe siècle pour pouvoir en faire une analyse. L’horaire de la cérémonie religieuse est en effet un indicateur précieux: il détermine le déroulement des festivités profanes des noces, accompagnées de repas et de danses. Il met donc en jeu les usages sociaux de la structure temporelle de la journée, le rapport de la société urbaine à la nuit, la prégnance du temps religieux sur les individus.”

VALVERDE, NURIA. “Small Parts: Crisóstomo Martínez (1638—1694), Bone Histology, and the Visual Making of Body Wholeness.” Isis 100 (September 2009), 505—536.

Contextualizes the work of the Valencian engraver (who came to Paris in 1687 with a commission to create an anatomical atlas, the only one of the period structured around the microscopic image) in cultural and historical discourses of wholeness. “Through the analysis of his osteological engravings, it is possible to appraise the extent to which the problem of illustrating the intrinsic unity of the skeleton from a dynamic point of view converged with that of producing a common human environment and destiny” (508).

WAGNER, MARIE-FRANCE, LOUISE FRAPPIER and CLAIRE LATRAVERSE, eds. Les jeux de l’échange: Entrées solennelles et divertissements du XVe au XVIIe siècle. Paris: Champion, 2007.

Review: F. Pilone in S Fr 154 (2008): 241. Literary and historical specialists examine in this volume the theme of exchange in its social relationships, ritual, political, economic and symbolic values. 17th C scholars will appreciate a number of important analyses in the two sections “Des entrées solennelles” and “Des divertissements,” ranging from women’s roles, the theatre, rhetoric, music and symbol. Indices of anonymous works, illustrations and names.

WILSON, PETER H. Europe’s Tragedy: A History of the Thirty Year’s War. London: Allen Lane, 2009.

Review: L. Martines in TLS 5556 (Sept 25 2009): 12—13. Wilson’s book is “most ambitious treatment of the Thirty Year’s War ever to appear in English.” This is a “sobre, wise, wide-seeing account, tenaciously researched and offered in limpid pose.” Book contains something for all readers, including “devotees of gender studies” and military historians. Reviewer says Wilson’s evidence “shows that the Thirty Years War was prolonged by foreign meddling, appalling supply lines, virulent disease, the chronic desertion of troops and the simple fact that princes could not afford war on such a scale.” A “magisterial history.”

ZALLOUA, ZAHI. “(Im)Perfecting the Self: Montaigne’s Pedagogical Ideal.” EMF 12 (2008): 111—126.

The author is concerned with the humanistic project of self-perfection, as we find it in Montaigne’s Essais. After initially turning to ancient and medieval ideals of self-perfection, Zalloua focuses on Montaigne’s alternative model of the “imperfect” self.