Chair Chair April 20184th, GenderStudies Committee Oana Panaïté Oana Brenda Weber Brenda Hall Bjørnstad Hall IMU, Maple Room IMU, FrenchandItalian FrenchandItalian FrenchandItalian contact the chair: chair: contact the 3:00pm, Wednesday, 3:00pm, Wednesday, [email protected] Nicolas Valazza, Valazza, Nicolas

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quite a few were begotten by two primordial divinities, Esthetics in 19th Esthetics DEPARTMENT OF FRENCH DEPARTMENT — Mélusine, Medusa, and the the Medusa, :and Mélusine, Scaly and Monstrous Ladies literature. studies in the modernity advent of in French foregrounds the significance of animal and posthuman of gender intermediality, studies my and work for on the way to literary creation. At the crossroads inspiration, grapple with it in the process, and examine the devices they handle modus operandi and they opt the ladies more often than not turn out to be Muses and, as such, enable the authors their personas in the texts to confront their own are incorporated and, most attached to poetic/literary of genius. As a matter of the fact, these “scaly” time, pinpoint problematics inspiration and the enterprise of writing. More specifically, I argue that they embody the esthetic principles of the works in which they French literature.Icontend that these entitiesand function asmetaliterary tropes thatpoint toward a reflection onthe process of representations of these female “reptilomorphic” monsters (physical or psychological) or “scaly ladies” in 19th scales and their undulating motion, is what “reptilomorphism.” I have come My to term research focuses on the multifaceted ed reptilian anatomic traits assimilation of the reptile as and the , well both characterized by their (Hesiod, Theogony). This namely namely the sea gods Phorcys and Keto ( ster,” hence the word “cetacean”) , and nightmares. Most of those monsters were related to The mythology and literature of Ancient Greece generated a plethora of female monsters who still haunt our modern imaginations, A Dissertation Defense by Loïc Lerme THE THE