Geeky French lit fangirling ahoy.

[tenlittlebullets]

About halfway through my library copy of George Sand's Horace. It's set 1831-32 and I can sense that there's going to be political stuff coming up--there has already been a fair amount of Saint-Simonianism, feminism, republicanism, and some Godefroy Cavaignac fangirling just for good measure. But the first half of the book is devoted to a frighteningly detailed and accurate study of domestic abuse; Sand does not pull her punches, and it's eerie and sad and impressive that, way before anything short of wife-beating was recognized as abusive, she wrote a relationship that could practically be used a modern-day checklist of what to watch out for. I ended up reading over a hundred pages of it in one afternoon (in French mind you) just to watch the trainwreck unfold.

Also on the reading list: Balzac's La Fille aux yeux d'or (there are lesbians!), Théophile Gautier's Mademoiselle de Maupin (crossdressing! genderfuck leading to sexual-orientation angst! bisexuality!), and I am pondering actually reading Thérèse Philosophe and/or Gamiani ou deux nuits d'excès because what is more fun than vintage French porn. (If your answer is "vintage French porn written by Musset possibly about George Sand," you are correct.) Should probably do that before I go to France so I can read it in public without being snickered at.

Real life rolls on as usual. End of semester is approaching, projects and essays and concerts are piling up, but the shitstorm hasn't quite hit yet. *crosses fingers*