A Narration of Female Experience: Christine de Pizan’s The Book of the City of Ladies

Abstract

Christine de Pizan (1363/1364?-1430) is recognised as the first professional female writer who left a significant mark not only on medieval literature but also women’s writing tradition. Depending on personal and collective female experience, she becomes the writer of over a hundred literary pieces in which she deals with different aspects of women’s lives in the patriarchal society of the medieval period. Her oeuvre displays a struggle against the misogynistic confines that limit and imprison women into degraded positions. This study aims to explore one of her significant works, The Book of the City of Ladies (1404-1405), in which de Pizan gives an account of various women’s stories and their achievements from pagan times to Christian history. In this narration of the medieval dream vision genre, de Pizan strategically uses allegorical characters to initiate a discussion on misogynistic discourse and practices. While the work unveils a panorama of the female experience, it offers a narrative that challenges patriarchal power and dominance. This paper illustrates how de Pizan empowers women’s existence in her narration based on female experience and predates feminist writing before later generations of women writers.

Keywords

• Christine de Pizan
• The Book of the City of Ladies
• Medieval Society
• Misogyny
• Female Empowerment

Christine de Pizan’ın The Book of the City of Ladies Adlı Eserinde Kadın Deneyiminin Anlatımı

Abstract

Christine de Pizan (1363/1364?-1430), sadece Orta Çağ edebiyatında değil aynı zamanda kadınların yazım geleneğinde önemli bir iz bırakan, ilk profesyonel kadın yazar olarak bilinir. Kişisel ve kolektif kadın deneyimine dayanarak, Orta Çağ döneminin ataerkil toplumunda kadınların yaşamının farklı yönlerini ele aldığı yüzlerce edebi eserin yazarı olmuştur. Eserleri, kadınları sınırlayan ve onları alçaltıcı durumlara hapseden ve kadın düşmanlığı sergileyen yapılara karşı mücadele ortaya koyar. Bu çalışma, pagan zamanlardan Hıristiyan tarihine farklı kadın hikayeleri ve başarılarını içeren de Pizan’ın önemli eserlerinden biri olan The Book of the City of Ladies (1404-1405) adlı çalışmasını irdelemeyi amaçlar. Bu Orta Çağ anlatı eserinde de, de Pizan alegorik karakterleri, kadın düşmanlığı söylemi ve uygulamaları hakkında bir tartışma başlatmak için stratejik biçimde kullanır. Eser kadınların deneyiminin panoramasını açığa çıkarırken, ataerkil güce ve hakimiyete meydan okuyan bir anlatı sunar. Bu çalışma de Pizan’ın kadın deneyimine dayanan anlatısında kadınların varlığını nasıl güçlendirdiğini ve sonraki kuşak kadın yazarlardan önce feminist yazımda öncü olduğunu gösterir.

Keywords

• kadınları güçlendirme
• Christine de Pizan
• The Book of the City of Ladies
• Orta Çağ Toplumu
• Kadın Düşmanlığı

References

1. Barratt, Alexandra. “Introduction.” in Women’s Writing in Middle English, ed. Alexandra Barratt, London: Pearson, 1992.
2. Brabant, Margaret, and Michael Brint. “Identity and Difference in Christine de Pizan’s Cité des Dames.” in Politics, Gender, and Genre: The Political Thought of Christine de Pizan, ed. Margaret Brabant, Oxford: Westview Press, 1992.
3. Brown-Grant, Rosalind. “Introduction.” in The Book of the City of Ladies, by Christine de Pizan, London: Penguin, 1999.
4. De Pizan, Christine. The Book of the City of Ladies. trans. Rosalind Brown-Grant, London: Penguin, 1999.
5. Dufresne, Laura Rinaldi. “Christine de Pizan’s Treasure of the City of Ladies: A Study of Dress and Social Hierarchy.” Woman’s Art Journal 16, No. 2 (1995-1996): 29-34.
6. Erol, Burçin. “Christine de Pisan: Ortaçağ’da Bir Kadın Hakları Savunucusu.” Kuram 10 (1996): 79-84.
7. Fiero, Gloria K. “The Dits: The Historical Context.” in Three Medieval Views of Women, ed. Gloria K. Fiero, Wendy Pfeffer, and Mathé Allain, London: Yale University Press, 1989.
8. Finkel, Helen Ruth. “The Portrait of the Woman in the Works of Christine de Pisan.” MA Thesis., Rice University, 1972.

9. Foucault, Michel. “The Discourse on Language.” in The Archaeology of Knowledge. trans. Sheridan Smith, Pantheon, New York, 1971.
10. Gabriel, Astrik L. “The Educational Ideals of Christine de Pisan.” Journal of the History of Ideas, 16, No. 1 (1995): 3-21.
11. Gower, Margaret Marion. “Glorifying God: The Theological Notion of Women in Christine de Pizan’s Livre de la Cite des Dames.” Religion&Literature, 54, No. 1-2 (2022): 185-207.
12. Haberstroh, Patricia Boyle. “Introduction.” in My Self, My Muse: Irish Women Poets Reflect on Life and Art, ed. Patricia Boyle Haberstroh, New York: Syracuse University Press, 2001.
13. Haralambidou, Penelope. “The Female Body Politic: Enacting the Architecture of The Book of the City of Ladies.” Architecture and Culture, 8(2020): 385-406.
14. Hindman, Sandra L. “With Ink and Mortar: Christine de Pizan’s Cité des Dames.” Feminist Studies, 10, No. 3 (1984): 457-483.
15. Ho, Cynthia “Communal and Individual Autobiography in Christine de Pizan’s Book of the City of Ladies.” CEA Critic, 57, No.1 (1994): 31-40.
16. Laennec, Christine Moneera. “Unladylike Polemics: Christine de Pizan’s Strategies of Attack and Defense.” Tulsa Studies in Women’s Literature, 12, No. 1 (1993): 47-59.
17. McLeod, Glenda, and Katharina Wilson. “The Misogamous Tradition and La Cité des Dames.” in The City of Scholars: New Approaches to Christine de Pizan, ed. Margarete Zimmermann and Dina De Rentiis, Berlin: Gruyter, 1994.
18. Mirabella, M. Bella. “Feminist Self-Fashioning: Christine de Pizan and The Treasure of the City of Ladies.” European Journal of Women’s Studies, 6, No. 1 ( 1999): 9-20.
19. Nowacka, Keiko. “Reflections on Christine de Pizan's ‘Feminism’.” Australian Feminist Studies, 17, No. 37 (2002): 81-97.
20. Petroff, Elizabeth Alvilda. “Women Writers of the Late Fourteenth Century – Seeking Models: Julian of Norwich, Margery Kempe, Doña Leonor López de Córdoba, and Christine de Pizan.” in Medieval Women’s Visionary Literature, ed. Elizabeth Alvilda Petroff, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1986.
21. Richards, Earl Jeffrey. “Introduction.” in The Book of the City of Ladies, by Christine de Pizan New York: Persea, 1982.
22. Rigby, S. H. “The Wife of Bath, Christine de Pizan, and the Medieval Case for Women.” The Chaucer View, 35, No. 2 (2000): 133-165.
23. Summit, Jennifer. “Women and Authorship.” in The Cambridge Companion to Medieval Women’s Writing, ed. Carolyn Dinshaw and David Wallace, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000.
24. Verini, Alexandra. “Medieval Models of Female Friendship in Christine de Pizan’s The Book of the City of Ladies and Margery Kempe’s The Book of Margery Kempe. ” Feminist Studies, 42, No. 6 (2016): 365-391.
25. Wheat, Edward M. “‘Now a New Kingdom of Femininity is Begun’: The Political Theory of Christine de Pizan’s The Book of The City of Ladies.” Women&Politics, 20, No. 4 (1999): 23-47.