Introduction

Abstract

The place of woman in early nineteenth-century French society was fraught with contradictions. She was worshipped as ‘Muse and Madonna’ of the society,¹ but was legally a non-person. She was the symbol of Truth and Justice, of Liberty and the Republic, yet she was simultaneously exploited and despised. In fact, the idealisation of ‘Woman’ as abstract entity contrasted dramatically with the subordinate position of real women in the economic, political and civil structures of their society. Since men dominated those structures and created the images, the contradictions between them illustrated men’s ambivalence towards women. However, the ambiguities in women’s position also reflected the uncertainties of a society which had undergone (and continued to experience) major political upheavals, and which faced the disruptions of incipient industrialisation. New patterns of economic and political life required and created new patterns of identity; new ways of relating to others in the society. For conservatives seeking ‘order’, liberals seeking ‘progress’, and socialists seeking a radical restructuring of society, defining women’s place in society, and constructing models of femininity which justified it, were crucial undertakings.