Master of Arts, Miami University, 2020, French, Italian, and Classical Studies

This thesis, written in English, is an analysis of melancholia and its relation to desire in the following nineteenth-century works: "El Desdichado" by Gerard de Nerval, Rene by Francois-Rene de Chateaubriand, and Charles Baudelaire's "L" invitation au voyage." This analysis will take a psychoanalytical approach, and will study how maternal, sororal, and feminine objects of desire relate to the melancholia that is represented on the pages of these works. In order to do so, we must dive into Sigmund Freud's "Mourning and Melancholia," which explains the inner functions of melancholia and the ego contained in all four works. Another psychoanalytic text that will be used is Julia Kristeva's Black Sun: Depression and Melancholia. This thesis seeks to prove that "L' invitation au voyage" is a melancholic poem that is driven by incestuous desires for a maternal figure, as well as a sororal figure, and that the melancholia found in Rene shares similar influences. It will also seek to prove that "El Desdichado" shows evidence of a triumph over melancholia caused by a feminine object of desire. Lastly, all three texts will be analyzed in parallel with Freud's text to demonstrate its accuracy especially in terms of the ego.

Committee: Jonathan Strauss (Committee Chair); Elisabeth Hodges (Committee Member); Anna Klosowska (Committee Member) Subjects: Language; Literature; Modern Language

Artium Baccalaureus (AB), Ohio University, 2020, French

Translation is likely as old as human language itself. From its ancient origins (Horace, Jerome, the Babel narrative) to the present day, writers and theorists have held changing and often contradictory views on the goals and values of translation. One important distinction is between approaches to translation that try to make the foreign text seem domestic, and those that try to preserve the foreign elements of a text even in a new language. In my thesis, I present the case for preserving foreign verse forms when poetry is translated into English, and provide a method for doing so in French-to-English translation. Also included are a brief theoretical history of translation, and a study in the historical practice of poetic translation. Finally, I provide a series of 32 translated poems by a representative selection of prominent poets from the 16th through the 19th centuries.

Committee: Christopher Coski PhD (Advisor) Subjects: Comparative Literature; European History; Foreign Language; Language; Literature; Modern Language; Modern Literature; Romance Literature

Master of Arts, Miami University, 2003, French, Italian, and Classical Studies

Charles Nodier et Gerard de Nerval entreprennent dans La Fee aux miettes et Aurelia une exploration du moi et de la destinee de ce moi a la recherche d-une verite transcendante qui est la quete du bonheur a travers une femme aimee irremediablement perdue. Pour cela ils developpent un mode d-expression en marge des modes litteraires de l-epoque en ayant recours au mode fantastique. En effet, l-exploration du moi est liee a la perception surnaturaliste intervenant dans les reves des protagonistes de ces deux contes. Il s-agit dans cette etude de voir comment l-irruption de l-irreel chez Nodier et Nerval creuse un espace dans lequel instaurer le moi et pourquoi l-irreel et le fantastique provoquent l-interrogation du moi en litterature jetant un doute sur sa sante mentale.

Committee: Jonathan Strauss PhD (Committee Chair); Elisabeth Hodges PhD (Committee Member); Anna Roberts PhD (Committee Member) Subjects: Literature