Autonarration and Genotext in Mary Hays' "Memoirs of Emma Courtney"

Rajan, Tilottama

doi:10.2307/25601004

Cited by 21 publications

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“…12 Criticised in England 'as ascandalous disrobing in public',the French narrativehad clearly been draped in different apparel. 13 [The novel is so differentfrom the original that it must be termedanimitation and not a translation. Struck by the mediocrity of the model, yet attracted by certain features of it, Madame Guizot altered the work instead of translating it, and, providing it with an almost entirely new background, she equipped it with aset of fine and moving observations.]…”

Section: Amotley Creationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Translation as De-Radicalization: On the Transforming of Mary Hays’s Memoirs of Emma Courtney into French

Bergmann

2017

Romantik

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The semi-autobiographicalc onfessional and feminist tract, Memoirs of Emma Courtney (1796), by the British radical writer Mary Hays (1759-1843),was translated into French by Pauline de Meulan (1773-1827)in1799, as La Chapelle D'Ayton, ou Emma Courtney. As opposed to its English model, which wasgiven amixed receptiondue to its emotional and compromising authentic background, the translated version became immensely popular in France. One reason for this wasthe major extensionmade to the action through the adding of plots and characters from several other British works. The article focusses on the various measures taken by the translator to purge the parts of the originalw ork she chose to maintain from their reliance on feminism and contemporary radical philosophies. This was carried out through aprocess of exclusion, character modification and alteration of genre. The methods for deepeningt he characterisationa nd improving the work stylistically are also analysed.

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Section: Amotley Creationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Translation as De-Radicalization: On the Transforming of Mary Hays’s Memoirs of Emma Courtney into French

Bergmann

2017

Romantik

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“…To take the example of fiction, despite thought‐provoking analyses of the permeable borders between fiction and autobiography in contemporary life writing theory, and some excellent studies of individual authors, we lack a more systematic approach. Tilottama Rajan has read the semi‐autobiographical fiction of Hays as an example of the ‘distinctively romantic “inter‐genre”’ of ‘autonarration’, which is ‘a textually self‐conscious work that draws upon personal experience as part of its rhetoric, so as to position experience within textuality and relate textuality to experience’ (149). This is a suggestive concept for other Romantic women authors, whose works are often read separately due to their designation as fiction, autobiography or correspondence.…”

Section: Future Directionsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Women's Life Writing in the Long 18th Century: A Critical Survey

Culley

2015

Literature Compass

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This essay provides an overview of developments in studies of British women's life writing in the long 18th century over the last 25 years and explores possible future directions at an exciting moment for the field. It addresses the expansion of the canon under the influence of feminist criticism and the shift in emphasis from autobiography to life writing as a hybrid and indeterminate form which works across disciplinary boundaries. It takes account of scholarly work on traditional categories of women's life writing, such as the scandalous memoir and spiritual autobiography, and considers more recent interests in biography, collective biography, afterlives and the letter. The article concludes with some reflections on potential avenues for future research, including a more rigorous approach to genre, the interrelations of manuscript and print and collaboration and collective authorship, as well as highlighting some of the challenges (and rewards) of working with life writing texts.

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“…In time, such institutions, and such hypocrisy, will be overcome; but not yet. If Emma’s generation has begun the revolution, it will be for little Augustus’s generation to complete it (Rajan, 1993, pp. 173–74).…”

Section: Would Give Myself To Youmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…2See Rajan (1993, pp. 149–50) for a commentary on the critical failure to appreciate the importance of Hays’s novels, particularly their role in developing a genre of testamentary narrative.…”

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confidence: 99%

“…4See Ty (1996, p. xx) and also Rajan, (1993, pp. 158–60), presenting the novel as an exemplar of an emergent romantic genre of ‘auto-narration’, in which ‘writers bring details from their personal lives into their texts, speaking in a voice that is recognizably their own or through a persona whose relation to the biographical author is obvious’, a ‘conscious’ and ‘specific form of self-writing’.…”

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confidence: 99%

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The prejudices of Mary Hays

Ward¹

2009

International Journal of Law in Context

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During the 1790s, Mary Hays was one of the most influential radical novelists and polemicists in England. She counted amongst her closest friends and mentors the likes of Joseph Johnson, William Godwin and Mary Wollstonecraft. During this tumultuous final decade of the century, she published two novels, The Memoirs of Emma Courtney and The Victim of Prejudice. Both were controversial in the extreme, attracting the opprobrium of conservative critics. What caused such consternation was not merely their vivid description of the myriad political and social injustices suffered by her female compatriots, but the role of the law in perpetuating such injustices. For much of the last two hundred years Hays has been a largely forgotten figure, her novels occasioning rare interest amongst literary critics and historians, rarer interest still amongst jurists. The purpose of this article is to address this neglect, and to recommend Hays as one of the most intriguing and urgent prophets of modern literary and jurisprudential feminism.

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Autonarration and Genotext in Mary Hays' "Memoirs of Emma Courtney"

Cited by 21 publications

References 0 publications

Translation as De-Radicalization: On the Transforming of Mary Hays’s Memoirs of Emma Courtney into French

Translation as De-Radicalization: On the Transforming of Mary Hays’s Memoirs of Emma Courtney into French

Women's Life Writing in the Long 18th Century: A Critical Survey

The prejudices of Mary Hays

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