Seminar in French Civilization: Queer Lyricism

This trans-historical course looks into three moments (antiquity, 16th c., and 19th-20th c.) to explore the connections between lyricism and same sex desire. With Sappho and her reception as a starting point, the readings and discussions focus on the poetry of the Pleiade and then modernist poetry from Baudelaire and after. Together with the cultural context regarding gender and sexuality, the course approaches lyricism's expression of the self in relation to an exploration and questioning of one's gender and sexuality, but also the lyric as the privileged genre for expressing socially non-normative desires and positions.