Bücher der Reihe Studies in Contemporary Women's Writing

Anorexia, bulimia and binge eating are the topics explored by contemporary writers in this volume on French, German and Italian women's writing. Eating disorders are presented as both a rebellion against and a conformity to gendered societal norms, helping to describe and redefine their portrayal in present-day Europe.

Strange Adventures examines portrayals of womanhood in the works of prize-winning French author Pierrette Fleutiaux. Throughout, Fleutiaux's depictions are shown to pose a challenge to existing conceptions of womanhood and individuality, thus opening up new understandings of what it means to be a woman, and to be human.

Experiment and Experience is a collection of critical essays on twenty-first-century women-authored literature in France. In particular, the volume focuses on how contemporary women's writing engages creatively with socio-political issues and real-life experiences. Topics include identities, family relations, violence, borders and the environment.

The decision to reject motherhood is the subject of several key works of literature in French since the new millennium. This book looks at first-person accounts of voluntary childlessness by women writing in French. The book explores how women narrate their decision not to mother, the issues that they face in doing so and the narrative techniques that they employ to justify their stories. It asks how these authors challenge stereotypes of the childless woman by claiming their own identity in narrative, publicly proclaiming their right to choose and writing a femininity that is not connected to motherhood. Using feminist, sociological and psychoanalytic theories to interrogate non-mothering, this work is the first book-length study of narratives that counter this long-standing taboo. It brings together authors who stake out a new terrain, creating a textual space in which to take ownership of their childlessness and call for new understandings of female identity beyond maternity.

Author of numerous books since 1991 and winner of the 2005 Prix Renaudot, Nina Bouraoui persistently explores the question of self-expression in her work. This study of Bouraoui's work examines how self-referential writing can represent a crucial act of resistance to a number of contemporary problems, including race, gender and social isolation.

Goliarda Sapienza (1924-1996) is increasingly regarded as a central figure in modern Italian literature. This study follows her autofictional journey, identifying themes in her work such as freedom, the body, gender and sexuality, political commitment and social transformation.

Mothers and mothering are significant features of contemporary women's writing in France, but in Marie NDiaye's writing, mothers often appear inadequate, abusive or even murderous. This book seeks to explore what this negative representation tells us about mothers and how mothers represent their own mothering to themselves.

Reimagining the Family is the first book-length study of representations of lesbian mothering in French literature. Focusing on female-authored texts published between 1970 and 2013, the book explores how literature reflects, engages with and even anticipates the recent, highly charged debates on the rights of same-sex couples in France.

This book explores the different treatment of writing by women andwriting by men in twenty-first-century Spain. Focusing on contemporarySpanish authors Ana María Matute (1926¿2014), Rosa Montero (1952¿),and Lucía Etxebarria (1966¿), the author examines how Spanish womenwriters are marketed in Spain and, in particular, how current marketingstrategies reinforce traditional structures of femininity.Through an analysis of their work and lives in the context of the FrancoRegime, the Transition to democracy and contemporary Spain, this bookprovides an innovative study of the construction of the public personaeof these key female writers. As social media and the internet transformauthors¿ relationship with their readers, the rapidly shifting publishingindustry offers an important context for the difficult balance betweenhigh levels of reception and visibility and the persistence of traditionalgender stereotypes.

«In this important comparative study, Polly Galis provides an illuminating ¿ and frank ¿ examination of the feminist tensions inherent in the inclusive and often transgressive modalities of female sexuality put forward by Nancy Huston, Nelly Arcan and Annie Ernaux, writers whose work subversively troubles the divide between 'good' and 'bad' models of bodily pleasure and desire.» (Siobhán McIlvanney, Professor of French and Francophone Women¿s Writing, King¿s College London)«An in-depth look at three important French-language women writers who tackle gender stereotypes, desire, the body, language and empowerment, this richly documented study is rigorous, thorough, illuminating and highly readable, with broader implications for contemporary feminism and women¿s writing within and beyond France and Quebec. A major contribution.» (Lori Saint-Martin, Professor of Literary Studies, University of Quebec in Montreal)This book is the first comparative study of the work of Francophone authors Annie Ernaux, Nancy Huston and Nelly Arcan, exploring their representation of sex, sexuality and the body. This book examines their narrative treatment of dominant sexual discourses, sexual difference and diverse feminine bodily experience, and thereby reveals these writers¿ distinctive contribution to contemporary women¿s writing in French and different feminisms, defined as «frank» French feminism. This feminist approach consists in tackling gender inequality, sexism and misogyny, while recognising the difficulties involved in feminist action, and acknowledging that adherence to allegedly oppressive gender stereotypes can actually prove enjoyable and empowering for women. This study examines the authors¿ earliest to latest publications and multiple genres and media, including fictional and autofictional novels, autobiographies, critical essays, phototexts, diaries, journals, illustrated oeuvres, media addresses and newspaper articles.This book project was the Winner of the 2019 Peter Lang Young Scholars Competition in Contemporary Women¿s Writing in French.