Water Imagery in George Sand’s Work Water Imagery in George Sand’s Work Edited by Françoise Ghillebaert and Madeleine Vala Water Imagery in George Sand’s Work Edited by Françoise Ghillebaert and Madeleine Vala This book first published 2018 Cambridge Scholars Publishing Lady Stephenson Library, Newcastle upon Tyne, NE6 2PA, UK British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library Copyright © 2018 by Françoise Ghillebaert, Madeleine Vala and contributors All rights for this book reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the copyright owner. ISBN (10): 1-5275-1579-6 ISBN (13): 978-1-5275-1579-6 Cover image: Le bord de la Creuse à Gargilesse, promenade habituelle de George Sand / River Creuse in Gargilesse, George Sand’s customary walk. Dessinateur Eugène Grandsire. Lithographie Joliet. Date: 19th century. Open license. Artist Eugène Grandsire. Lithograph Joliet. http://www.bn-limousin.fr/items/show/144 I dedicate this book to all the people who were left without water and power for weeks, and even months after Hurricane María hit the island of Puerto Rico on September 20, 2017. To my mother and father For their unconditional support TABLE OF CONTENTS Acknowledgments ................................................................... xi Introduction ........................................................................... xiii Françoise Ghillebaert Chapter One: Life and Death in Bodies of Water Part 1: Drowning Imagery Death by Water: A Triad of Ambiguity in Indiana and Lélia ................................................................................... 5 Abbey Carrico De l’eau noire du suicide à la féerie merveilleuse de l’illusion blanche ............................................................... 39 Àngels Santa Part 2: Water and the Initiatory Journey L’héroïne gothique face à l’abîme aquatique dans Indiana (1832) et Consuelo (1841) ..................................................... 61 Marilyn Mallia Eaux courantes, sublime et passion dans Jean de la Roche ............................................................................. 85 Corinne Fournier Kiss viii Table of Contents Chapter Two: Relationships in Aquatic Contexts Part 1: Ecocriticism and Human Relationships with Nature Water Worlds: An Ecocritical Approach to “La Reine Coax” ................................................................................... 109 Annie K. Smart Watery Prison or Paradise: Isolation and Relation in Un hiver à Majorque ........................................................ 133 Rachel Corkle Part 2: Homosocial Relationships and Liquid Metaphors of Kinship Eau et homosociabilité dans Teverino ................................. 153 Françoise Ghillebaert Hospitality and Fluid Kinship in Indiana ............................ 181 Phillip Griffith Chapter Three: Water as a Source of Artistic Creation Part 1: Water and Tears in the Arts Watercolours and Dendrites, Lakes and Seascapes: Water in George Sand’s Visual Art ..................................... 213 Emilie Sitzia Larmes et apprentissage dans l’œuvre de George Sand ....... 237 Lara Popic Water Imagery in George Sand’s Work ix Part 2: Water and Authorial Creativity Water Symbolism in Histoire de ma vie and Marianne: Catholic Narratology of Atonement ..................................... 267 Nancy Ann Watanabe Symboles et spectacles de l’eau marine dans Le Drac ........ 293 Nicola Pasqualicchio Contributors ......................................................................... 323 Abstracts ............................................................................... 329 List of Primary Works and Characters ................................. 337 ACKNOWLEDGMENTS I wish to express my gratitude to the contributors of this volume for their kind patience. Without their continuing participation I could not have completed the present work. Several course releases granted by the College of Humanities and the Department of Foreign Languages at the University of Puerto Rico, Río Piedras campus, helped me make this book a reality. I am especially beholden to the peer reviewers of this volume for their keen observations. Above all, I would like to thank my colleague Madeleine Vala for her meticulous editorial work and helpful suggestions on the manuscript. Finally, I am most grateful to my long-time friend Jeanne Llewellyn whose unflagging encouragements and decisiveness pulled me out of a state of despondency after Hurricane María hit the island of Puerto Rico. While she provided me with a comfortable and stable home for six weeks away from chaos, I was able to communicate with and reassure both the contributors and Cambridge Scholars Publishing that this project would continue. INTRODUCTION FRANÇOISE GHILLEBAERT On Sand and Water Cet affluent, c’est la Gargilesse, Un bijou de torrent jeté dans des roches et dans des ravines Où il faut nécessairement aller chercher ses grâces et ses beautés avec un peu de peine. Promenades autour d’un village1 Water is a fluid and transparent substance. It is virtually odorless and colorless but bodies of water take their color from the thickness of water, aquatic plants, and the sky that they reflect: turquoise blue in the crystal, clear shallow waters of white sandy beaches; dark blue or seaweed green in deep oceans; multiple shades of grey in stormy weather. Water−fresh, saline, or atmospheric−abounds everywhere on earth and moves continuously from one reservoir to another in the form of rain, streams, rivers, ponds, fountains, springs, lakes, swamps, underground water tables, seas, and oceans. In doing so, water goes through different forms: liquid, solid, and vapor. While water is essentially fluid, more palpable shapes of water are mist, ice, or snowflakes. Water is also manifest in all forms of life on earth: plants, animals, and the human body, particularly in tears. The omnipresence of water in all the elements on earth attests to its importance that Jules 1 George Sand, Promenades autour d’un village, 108. xiv Introduction Michelet summarizes as, “the most potent and the most elastic of all forms.”2 Water is essential for the maintenance of life and ecosystems. It is also necessary for the world economy; yet like all natural resources on earth, its supply is part of a closed system and therefore potentially exhaustible.3 A recent guide on the politics of water in the European Union underscores the importance of water in the environment, not only in Europe but globally, thus highlighting the interconnectivity of world economies.4 Water has multiple uses not only in the process of sustaining life on earth, but also in agriculture, as well as in industry. Indeed, natural disasters such as the one that Puerto Rico recently experienced remind us of the necessity to protect the supply and distribution of water, and also to contain its ferocious strength that can cause floods of biblical magnitude. Thus, water has both a positive and negative effect on human and economic life. Yet, we may wonder if water’s greatest impact lies in life maintenance or if it commands our thoughts more substantially. If so, the common knowledge of water’s power to erase all traces in a purifying process could be discounted by recent research, which suggests that water keeps memories of its molecules, as the French scientist Jacques Benveniste claimed in a 2 Jules Michelet, The Sea, 333. 3 United Nations Secretary General António Guterres declared at the launch of the International Decade for Action: Water for Sustainable Development, 2018-2018: “By 2050 at least one in four people will live in a country where the lack of fresh water will be chronic or recurrent.” https://news.un.org/en/story/2018/03/1005671. Accessed on April 1, 2018. 4 Ivan Conesa Alcolea, Mathieu Bousquet. L’eau et l’Union européenne: un guide sur la politique, sa mise en œuvre et ses instruments. Plouzané: Ifremer, 2001. In the same vein, the Puerto Rican government updated its plan for water resources in March 2016. https://aldia.microjuris.com/2016/03/03/drna- presenta-actualizacion-del-plan-integral-de-recursos-de-agua-y-celebracion- de-vistas-publicas/ Consulted on March 28, 2018. Water Imagery in George Sand’s Work xv controversial article published in Nature.5 The hypothesis formulated by Benveniste has not yet been proven, although Nobel Prize recipient Luc Montagnier6 is pursuing his research in the same direction. Whatever the results of such research may be, water attracts the attention of scientists and thinkers alike. Given the polymorphism and polyvalence of water on earth, it is hardly surprising that, as John Gregory Brown writes, “images of water should play such a prominent and recurrent role as a metaphor in literature.”7 Literature is probably the most flexible mode of communication to express thoughts and feelings by way of literal and figurative speech, tropes, metaphors, and symbols. There are, indeed, as many mentions of water as there are thoughts. While water can be referred to in a literal sense, most often it is associated with symbols through imagery. Throughout literature, water symbolizes not only birth and renewal, but also death by drowning. Water is deeply connected to people’s lives: where they live, and how they relate to or depend on water. Water binds lands and continents, and sends the hero on a journey towards