Christine de Pizan (c. 1365–1431) — Parisian author born in Venice (although, as her name indicates, her family traced its origins to Pizzano, about twenty-five kilometres to the south of Bologna) — is often regarded as the first person in France, male or female, to have earned a living by her pen.
This research discusses The Treasure of the City of Ladies, a manuscript written by Christine de Pizan in France during the early fifteenth century to give guidance on account-keeping and budgeting.
In what ways can medieval texts be looked at as fan works? How might the rhetorical tools of fan studies or affect theory aid in further understanding of these texts? Likewise, can we use medieval understandings of literary production to look at modern fan works in order to complicate our contemporary ideas of authorship?
Although the works of Christine de Pizan have been of interest to scholars for some time, technological advances and initiatives to make digital copies of manuscripts available online have only recently enabled close comparisons between the visual programmes of her works to be made.
This article attempts to identify the different styles employed by Christine de Pizan in all of her works using empirically based stylometric analysis.
Letter to the god of love (1399) is the first literary quarrel surprisingly set up by a woman to be found in the French language. Christine de Pizan goes to the palace court to stand for women by replying against the misogyny present in Roman de la rose. It is our aim to analyze Christine de Pizan’s discourse in the Middle Ages context.
Writers during the reigns of Charles V (r. 1364-80), Charles VI (r. 1380-1422), and Charles VII (r. 1422-61) produced a great deal of what Jean-Philippe Genet has referred to as “political literature,” a term that usefully avoids categorizing the books and poems according to modern definitions of genre such as that of the “mirror for princes.”
I examine Boccaccio’s authoritative and Latin Famous Women (1361) and its reworkings in Chaucer’s The Legend of Good Women (1386-1394) and Christine de Pizan’s The Book of the City of Ladies (1405).
Christine de Pizan was an author living in 15th century France whose writings highlighted the courageous actions of women that helped to strengthen their society.
Here it is argued that while Christine stressed the importance of reciprocity and mutuality within the political community, she also emphasised the need for hierarchy and deference and that, even by medieval standards, she was profoundly suspicious of popular involvement in political life.
Her stories function as a reply to the ones in the Bible and try to refute the misrepresentation of the women in it. Hence, it would not be wrong to state that she was among the first defenders of equality between the sexes and that she was courageous enough to stand up to the holy book.
This thesis is concerned with the supervised manuscripts of the works of Christine de Pizan (ca 1364-ca 1430), the first female author who could make a living from the products of her pen.
The early fifteenth-century French writer Christine de Pizan had personal conflicts with both her mother and her daughter, as we know from the autobiographical passages included in works she composed from 1402 to 1405.
The image of Christine in her study is enthralling – I expect all who know her work and have seen some of the illustrations in her manuscripts feel the same about it. Ever since I first became involved with her I have been seduced by the idea of this amazing woman in her book-lined cell, expounding for our delight her love of learning and her pleasure in her work.
Christine de Pizan’s Book of the City of Ladies, written over six centuries ago, is neither simple nor simplistic. As the first known history of women in Western civilization from a female point of view, it embraces all virtuous women even beyond those specifically mentioned. Fashioned as an allegorical city, it should be considered a potential textual buttress for contemporary feminist consciousness.
In the fall of 2003 I taught an honors seminar at Arkansas State University that engaged students in the act of re-visioning. The course focused on medieval and early modern women writers and was designed to dispel the misconception that the literary, artistic, and cultural contributions of these women were nil or at best insignificant.
Christine de Pizan’s Enseignemens moraux, or Moral teachings, is a collection, in the modern edition by Maurice Roy, of one hundred thirteen nuggets of moral and practical advice addressed to the author’s son.
Many scholars participating in the current boom in Christine de Pizan studies tend to think of the “discovery of Christine” as a phenomenon limited to the past thirty—or even ten—years. In truth, however, Christine has been alive in the Western literary imagination—if not flamboyantly so—since the fifteenth century.
In late medieval Paris, prostitutes were everywhere, it seems. Looking at the map published in Bronislaw Geremek’s study of the margins of medieval society we get the impression that prostitutes were in fact not marginal at all, at least as far as their locations are concerned.
Do you know of other articles that should be included in this list? Please let us know by emailing us at [email protected]
Here is a list of articles, dissertations and theses about the medieval writer Christine de Pizan that you can access online for free:
Tracy Adams, Christine de Pizan, French Studies, Vol. 71:3 (2017)
Christine de Pizan (c. 1365–1431) — Parisian author born in Venice (although, as her name indicates, her family traced its origins to Pizzano, about twenty-five kilometres to the south of Bologna) — is often regarded as the first person in France, male or female, to have earned a living by her pen.
Frances Miley and Andrew Read, Choreography of the past: accounting and the writing of Christine de Pizan, Accounting Historians Journal, Vol. 44:1 (2017)
This research discusses The Treasure of the City of Ladies, a manuscript written by Christine de Pizan in France during the early fifteenth century to give guidance on account-keeping and budgeting.
E. J. Nielsen, Christine de Pizan’s “The Book of the City of Ladies” as reclamatory fan work, Transformative Works and Cultures, Vol.25 (2017)
In what ways can medieval texts be looked at as fan works? How might the rhetorical tools of fan studies or affect theory aid in further understanding of these texts? Likewise, can we use medieval understandings of literary production to look at modern fan works in order to complicate our contemporary ideas of authorship?
Charlotte Cooper, A re-assessment of text-image relationships in Christine de Pizan’s didactic works, PhD Dissertation, University of Oxford, 2016
Although the works of Christine de Pizan have been of interest to scholars for some time, technological advances and initiatives to make digital copies of manuscripts available online have only recently enabled close comparisons between the visual programmes of her works to be made.
Earl Jeffrey Richards, David J. Wrisley and Liliane Dulac, The Different Styles of Christine de Pizan: An Initial Stylometric Analysis, Le Moyen Français, Vol. 78/79 (2016)
This article attempts to identify the different styles employed by Christine de Pizan in all of her works using empirically based stylometric analysis.
Maria Ascenção Ferreira Apolonia, Letter to the god of love (1399): the first literary quarrel set up by a woman to be found in the French language, Acta Scientiarum: Language and Culture, Vol. 37:3 (2015)
Letter to the god of love (1399) is the first literary quarrel surprisingly set up by a woman to be found in the French language. Christine de Pizan goes to the palace court to stand for women by replying against the misogyny present in Roman de la rose. It is our aim to analyze Christine de Pizan’s discourse in the Middle Ages context.
Kristin Leigh Erika Bourassa, Counselling Charles VI of France: Christine de Pizan, Honorat Bovet, Philippe de Mézières, and Pierre Salmon, PhD Dissertation, University of York, 2014
Writers during the reigns of Charles V (r. 1364-80), Charles VI (r. 1380-1422), and Charles VII (r. 1422-61) produced a great deal of what Jean-Philippe Genet has referred to as “political literature,” a term that usefully avoids categorizing the books and poems according to modern definitions of genre such as that of the “mirror for princes.”
Maryann Corbett, Ballade III by Christine de Pizan, Transference: Vol. 1 (2013)
I first happened upon the work of Christine de Pizan for a poet’s challenge, looking for a less-known woman poet to translate.
Eva M. Jones, Women’s Historiography in Late Medieval European Literature: Giovanni Boccaccio, Geoffrey Chaucer, and Christine de Pizan, PhD Dissertation, University of Rhode Island, 2013
I examine Boccaccio’s authoritative and Latin Famous Women (1361) and its reworkings in Chaucer’s The Legend of Good Women (1386-1394) and Christine de Pizan’s The Book of the City of Ladies (1405).
Vickie Mann, Christine de Pizan and Sacred History, Academic Leadership Journal in Student Research, Vol. 1 (2013)
Christine de Pizan was an author living in 15th century France whose writings highlighted the courageous actions of women that helped to strengthen their society.
Stephen H. Rigby, The Body Politic in the Social and Political Thought of Christine de Pizan, Cahiers de recherches médiévales et humanistes (2013)
Here it is argued that while Christine stressed the importance of reciprocity and mutuality within the political community, she also emphasised the need for hierarchy and deference and that, even by medieval standards, she was profoundly suspicious of popular involvement in political life.
Merve Aydogdu, Christian Egalitarianism: The Book of the City of Ladies Versus the Bible, Idil Sanat ve Dil Dergisi, Vol. 1 (2012)
Her stories function as a reply to the ones in the Bible and try to refute the misrepresentation of the women in it. Hence, it would not be wrong to state that she was among the first defenders of equality between the sexes and that she was courageous enough to stand up to the holy book.
Johannes Franciscus Aussems, Christine de Pizan: the Scribal Fingerprint, PhD Dissertation, University of Edinburgh, 2011
This thesis is concerned with the supervised manuscripts of the works of Christine de Pizan (ca 1364-ca 1430), the first female author who could make a living from the products of her pen.
Barbara A. Goodman, The City of Ladies; a Lady of Cities, Medieval Feminist Forum: A Journal of Gender and Sexuality, Vol. 45 (2009)
In all of the texts, Christine and Melusine serve as principal city-builders who design and construct their cities using both their brains and hands.
Lori J. Walters, Mother-Daughter Conflicts and Their Resolution in the Works of Christine de Pizan, Generationen und gender in mittelalterlicher und frühneuzeitlicher Literatur (2009)
The early fifteenth-century French writer Christine de Pizan had personal conflicts with both her mother and her daughter, as we know from the autobiographical passages included in works she composed from 1402 to 1405.
Susan Groag Bell, Christine de Pizan in her study, Cahiers de recherches médiévales et humanistes (2008)
The image of Christine in her study is enthralling – I expect all who know her work and have seen some of the illustrations in her manuscripts feel the same about it. Ever since I first became involved with her I have been seduced by the idea of this amazing woman in her book-lined cell, expounding for our delight her love of learning and her pleasure in her work.
Jill E. Wagner, Christine de Pizan’s City of Ladies: A Monumental (Re)construction of, by, and for Women of All Time, Medieval Feminist Forum: A Journal of Gender and Sexuality, Vol. 44:1 (2008)
Christine de Pizan’s Book of the City of Ladies, written over six centuries ago, is neither simple nor simplistic. As the first known history of women in Western civilization from a female point of view, it embraces all virtuous women even beyond those specifically mentioned. Fashioned as an allegorical city, it should be considered a potential textual buttress for contemporary feminist consciousness.
Frances Malpezzi, Building a City of Ladies with Christine de Pizan and Arkansas State University Honors Students, Journal of the National Collegiate Honors Council (2006)
In the fall of 2003 I taught an honors seminar at Arkansas State University that engaged students in the act of re-visioning. The course focused on medieval and early modern women writers and was designed to dispel the misconception that the literary, artistic, and cultural contributions of these women were nil or at best insignificant.
Christine Reno, Christine de Pizan’s Enseignemens moraux: Good Advice for Several Generations (2005)
Christine de Pizan’s Enseignemens moraux, or Moral teachings, is a collection, in the modern edition by Maurice Roy, of one hundred thirteen nuggets of moral and practical advice addressed to the author’s son.
Nadia Margolis, “Each…according…to his intention”: Three Phases of Christine de Pizan’s Literary Influence Through the Ages, Florilegium, Vol. 18:1 (2001)
Many scholars participating in the current boom in Christine de Pizan studies tend to think of the “discovery of Christine” as a phenomenon limited to the past thirty—or even ten—years. In truth, however, Christine has been alive in the Western literary imagination—if not flamboyantly so—since the fifteenth century.
Renate Blumenfeld-Kosinski, Christine de Pizan’s Advice to Prostitutes, Medieval Feminist Newsletter Vol. 27 (1999)
In late medieval Paris, prostitutes were everywhere, it seems. Looking at the map published in Bronislaw Geremek’s study of the margins of medieval society we get the impression that prostitutes were in fact not marginal at all, at least as far as their locations are concerned.
Do you know of other articles that should be included in this list? Please let us know by emailing us at [email protected]
Click here to read more about Christine de Pizan on Medievalists.net
Top Image: British Library MS Harley 4431 fol. 4r
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