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Examining French literature from the medieval period, Findley revises our understanding of medieval literary composition as a largely masculine activity, suggesting instead that writing is seen in these texts as problematically gendered and often feminizing.

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Introduction: Authors, Writers, Singers, and Women: Gendering Literary Creation in Medieval French Culture PART I: FROM MINSTREL HEROINE TO POET HEROINE: THE THIRTEENTH CENTURY AND BEYOND 1. Singing from a Woman´s Body: Minstrel Heroines as Performers and Texts 2. The Parrot and the Swan: Performance and Composition in Sone de Nansay PART II: DANGEROUS MUSES: TOUTE BELLE AND HER SISTERS IN THE FOURTEENTH CENTURY DIT 3. Competing Perspectives: Guillaume de Machaut´s Voir Dit 4. A Contemporary Reaction to the Voir Dit: Deadly Words and Captive Imaginations in Jean Froissart´s Prison Amoureuse PART III: WOMEN AT THE ORIGINS: FIFTEENTH CENTURY PROSE ROMANCE 5. Verbal Prowess: Women´s Artistry and Men´s Chivalry in Perceforest 6. Women Writers and the Monstrous Author in Ysa˜e le Triste Conclusion: What About Christine?

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"Findley´s study not only does exactly what she claims it will, but, via its combination of close readings and feminist theory, it also produces important new insights into medieval narrative, its depictions of gender, and its conception of literary creation In short, this is a volume that deserves to be widely read by medieval literary scholars, and feminist scholars of French literature more broadly as it offers much not only to scholars of the medieval French texts it studies, but also to those concerned with the intersection of women and medieval literary production more broadly. Indeed it can likely be read with much profit by scholars concerned with issues of female literary creation in other periods, for it offers innovative, insightful analysis that has application and implications well beyond the corpus of texts it studies." - The Medieval Review

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Brooke Heidenreich Findley is Assistant Professor of French and Women´s Studies at Penn State Altoona, USA.

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