Abstract
AbstractThis essay offers a comparative analysis of three early modern versions of Laodamia’s letter to Protesilaus, Heroides 13. It places the versions by Marie de Gournay (1626), Madeleine de Scudéry and her brother, Georges (1642), and Marie-Jeanne L’Héritier (1732) in the context of significant cultural changes occurring in France at this time: in translation practice, with the emergence of the ‘belles infidèles’ (unfaithful beauties); in the reception of antiquity; and in the literary field, with the rise of salon culture. Focusing on the motif of faithfulness, as both a female virtue and (an unfashionable) translation practice, it argues that translations of Laodamia reveal the complex aesthetic and ethical demands placed on women in the public sphere. By examining how these authors responded to each other, it shows that while there is an alternative, non-male history of early modern Ovidian reception, it was not necessarily constructed as such at the time.
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