Men of Their Words

This book uses the fiction of George Sand to explore questions of masculinity as they pertain to the nineteenth-century French novel. Drawing on contemporary theories of gender and narrative, Harkness reveals how Sands novels repeatedly focus on a nexus of language, masculinity and power. Introduction 1. Conceptualizing Nineteenth-Century Masculinity: Male and Female Gazes 2. Masculinity, Homosociality, and Representation 3. A Man's Word is his Power 4. The Father—Son Relationship and Literary Paternity 5. Disrupting Narratives of Masculine Desire 6. Conclusion: The Poetics of Masculinity