Reconstructing Woman - Dorothy (Boston University) Kelly - Bog

Explores a scenario common to the works of four major French novelists of the nineteenth century: Balzac, Flaubert, Zola, and Villiers. Here, in the texts of each author, a "new Pygmalion" (as Balzac calls one of his characters) turns away from a real woman he has loved or desired and prefers instead his artificial re-creation of her.