Abstract
ABSTRACT This article analyses the creative translations of Marianne Wilhelmine de Stevens, focusing on her French verse versions of Christian Fürchtegott Gellert's tales Der zärtliche Mann and Die zärtliche Frau (1746/1748), which – I will argue – ironically expose gender prejudices in order to criticise them. My comparison of her versified translations of 1777 with the original German texts, on the one hand, and the French prose versions published by François-Vincent Toussaint in 1768, on the other, demonstrates the extent to which de Stevens was able to reconcile her literary aspirations with her reflections on the role of women, especially that of wives within the marital context. Despite the constraints of a verse translation, de Stevens clearly distanced herself from Gellert and her predecessor Toussaint by offering a new reading of the two tales in question.
Published Version
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