| 31031 |
Creator |
9ba4d90aa1f1cb9c7f1003a4520e0fad |
| 31031 |
Date |
2012-01 |
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Is Part Of |
repository |
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Is Part Of |
p1533855X |
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abstract |
Diderot’s well-known commentary on Greuze’s Girl Weeping over a Dead Bird (1765) is
the source for the generally accepted interpretation of the painting as an allegory
of lost virginity. This essay challenges the authority of Diderot’s account by relating
the image to representations of the young girl in a range of eighteenth-century discourses,
including aesthetic theory, sentimental fiction and medical literature. It contends
that the painting does not cater to the desiring gaze in a straightforwardly erotic
fashion; rather than being a lover as such, the implied spectator is a quasi-paternal
figure, who disavows his own desire for the girl whilst nevertheless relishing the
illusion of intimacy with her. In thereby raising the specter of incest even as it
represses it, Greuze’s Weeping Girl exemplifies deep-seated tensions within later
eighteenth-century French culture. |
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authorList |
authors |
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status |
peerReviewed |
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uri |
http://data.open.ac.uk/oro/document/48041 |
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uri |
http://data.open.ac.uk/oro/document/48042 |
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uri |
http://data.open.ac.uk/oro/document/48044 |
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uri |
http://data.open.ac.uk/oro/document/48045 |
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volume |
117 |
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type |
AcademicArticle |
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type |
Article |
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label |
Barker, Emma (2012). Reading the Greuze Girl: the daughter's seduction. Representations,
117 pp. 86–119. |
| 31031 |
label |
Barker, Emma (2012). Reading the Greuze Girl: the daughter's seduction. Representations,
117 pp. 86–119. |
| 31031 |
Title |
Reading the Greuze Girl: the daughter's seduction |
| 31031 |
in dataset |
oro |