Educating the Female Orphan: Didactical Discourses in Mid-Eighteenth- Century Cross-Channel Literature
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Educating the Female Orphan: Didactical Discourses in Mid-eighteenth- century Cross-channel Literature. Samuel Wale. A perspective View of the Foundling Hospital, with emblematic figures, by Wale; engraved by Grignion and Canot. Inscription: These Mansions rais’d by Patrons kind and great, Where Babes deserted find a safe Retreate. Tho Frechmen sneer; Their boasted first Design, British Benevolence shall far outshine. Josje Siemensma 4054792 Dr. M. Corporaal – Prof. A. Montoya Research Master Literary Studies Research Master Thesis HLCS 27 June 2016 Table of Contents The Ubiquitous Orphan: The Orphan in Eighteenth-Century British and French Literature. ................. 5 Liminal Ambiguous Children: The Perception of the Orphan and its Education in Eighteenth-Century British and French Society .................................................................................................................... 20 Let Me Tell You My History: Narrating the Orphan’s Pedagogical Journey in Marivaux’s La Vie de Marianne and Mary Collyer’s The Virtous Orphan .............................................................................. 33 From Foundling to Orphan: Social Status and Agency in Haywood’s The Fortunate Foundlings, Crébillon’s Les Heureux Orphelins, and Kimber’s The Happy Orphans ............................................. 64 Transcending National Boundaries: The Transnational Female Orphan Narrative Template and Education in Eighteenth-Century Cross-Channel Novels ................................................................... 119 Works Cited ......................................................................................................................................... 127 Josje Siemensma 4054792/ 4 Josje Siemensma 4054792/ 5 The Ubiquitous Orphan: The Orphan in Eighteenth-Century British and French Literature. Could I but say I was descended from honest, tho’ mean parents, I would not murmur at my fate, but I have none, - none to own me; - I am nothing, - a kind of reptile in humanity, and have been shewn in a genteel way of life only to make my native misery more conspicuous. (Eliza Haywood, The Fortunate Foundlings 177-178) Lamenting her fate, Louisa, the female protagonist in Eliza Haywood’s The Fortunate Foundlings (1744), locates the root of her ambivalent social position in the nature of the training she received during her childhood, which appears to be incompatible with her status as a foundling. Indeed, Louisa’s position demonstrates the precarious and ambiguous nature of the orphan in eighteenth- century literature and, by extension, society. Her excellent education, provided for her by her generous and loving foster-father proves to be the source of her struggles and difficulties in society rather than a secure route to social stability. Thus, Haywood’s novel raises a few questions: Is such a privileged education beneficial at all, if it worsens the orphan’s social position and opportunities for self- sufficiency? Or should Louisa’s education have been more mindful of her precarious and marginal social position, instead of allowing her to grow up in a wealthy environment as a penniless and abandoned child? The position of the orphan in both eighteenth-century society and literature was ambiguous and wrought with anxiety. This study will examine how in the eighteenth-century French and British novel the female orphan’s education is portrayed and to what extent these representations reflect the educational practices and instructions implemented to control and care for the numerous abandoned children in eighteenth-century Europe. The orphan, who became an ubiquitous character in literature, also featured prominently in social debates, as numerous abandoned children roamed the streets of eighteenth-century Paris and London. In the novel the orphan’s estrangement from familial structures and relationship is dramatised, while simultaneously these works express the desire and necessity of assimilating these liminal individuals into the, preferably original, family. The orphan’s complete lack of any form of kinship was depicted as a problematic and complicating phenomenon, which Eva König in her monograph The Orphan in Eighteenth-Century Fiction describes as follows: The worst that can befall a character is the loss of his or her origins, and the work of the text is to find the missing link and heal the trouble in the family that has caused the orphaning before reintegrating the orphan in to the family. (1) With this drive to discover the ancestry of the abandoned character, the novel emphasises the character’s potential for mobility and lack of stability which enables authors to explore the structures of various familial circles and social institutions. Nevertheless, to perceive the orphan solely as a Josje Siemensma 4054792/ 6 vessel for authors through which they examined social structures and ideologies, is lopsided. The eighteenth-century orphan character is by definition a product of its historical, cultural, and social context shaped and influenced by contemporary discourses on orphanhood and foundling care. The fictional orphan’s access to multiple social classes and communities allow various perspectives on pedagogical practices and standards in connection to orphanhood to enter the narration. Which of these forms of education are deemed preferable for the fictional female orphan in eighteenth-century novels? And to what extent were these representations of the female orphan’s education affected by social discourses and ideologies on foundling care and education in eighteenth-century France and Britain? The orphan as a literary figure and as an eighteenth-century individual has been examined numerous times (Robert, 1972; König, 2014; Zunshine, 2005, Nixon, 2011; Herman, 2009; Seth, 2009 and 2012). These studies examine the orphans from various perspectives ranging from physiological (Robert), Lacanian analyses (König), to new historical approaches, comparing literary representations of orphanhood with their depiction in judicial documents (Nixon) or national discourses on illegitimacy (Zunshine) or orphanhood (Seth). Although these studies mention educational practices to varying degrees, none actually address the position of the orphan in the eighteenth-century educational debate and the representation of this issue in eighteenth-century novels in both France and Britain. The prominence of the orphan in an emerging genre which associated itself with pedagogical discourses and practices should not be neglected in the analysis of this literary figure. The eighteenth-century novel has for a long time been perceived and examined as a national product, as several scholars produced accounts of the novel and its history which analysed this phenomenon in a predominantly national context (see Watt, 1960; McKeon, 1987; DeJean, 1991; Ballaster, 1992; Spacks, 2006; May, 1963; Coulet, 1968; Huet, 1975; DiPiero, 1992; Mander, 1999)1. Yet in recent years scholars have started to challenge this perception, and instead argued that the novel found its origin in a fertile and expansive cross-cultural European network (see McMurran, 2010 ; Frail, 2007; ; Mander, 2007; Cohen & Dever, 2002; Moretti, 2006 and 2007; Casanova, 2004; Hayes, 2009). Indeed, the pervasiveness of the orphan character in eighteenth-century French and British fiction and the discussion of the orphan’s problematic social position in numerous pamphlets, essays, and other writings indicate that the orphan, both real and fictional, stimulated the eighteenth-century imagination and anxieties, while crossing national borders in its fictional depiction. However, to which extent is the depiction of this literary character affected by national or transnational ideologies and anxieties? Is the narrative template of the female orphan in relation to her education and its depiction in the eighteenth-century novel intrinsically national or transnational? In this study, literary exchange between France and Britain will be examined through applying translation and cultural transfer 1 This is but a small selection of the numerous monographs and collections written on the development of the novel genre in both French and English literary criticism. These studies examine the emergence, historical, and social position of the novel from various perspectives and literary theories. Furthermore, some scholars comment on the particularly nationalistic perspective adopted in previous studies, yet few address the cross-cultural network affecting the reception and perception of the novel in eighteenth-century European society. Josje Siemensma 4054792/ 7 studies. These theories will be used to compare originals and translations of two eighteenth-century orphan novels in order to answer the following research question: Is the depiction of the education of the female orphan in cross-channel novels from 1740-1760 affected by nation-specific cultural and pedagogical differences and preferences? Or can we rather speak of transnational perspective in the novel? The pedagogical nature and elements of the novel will be addressed in this comparative research by adopting a New-Historicist method to examine eighteenth-century perspectives, theories on, and practices of orphan education in France and Britain expressed in pamphlets, essays, and other literary genres and how these are reflected in the novels and their translations. This comparative study will focus on the similarities between the fictional and non-fictional representation of the orphan in eighteenth-century