ZARKA LA DALMATE ET MELITZA LA MONTÉNÉGRINE, FIGURES INSOLITES DE L'IMAGINAIRE DE LEOPOLD SACHER-MASOCH – ENTRE HÉROÏNES MASOCHIENNES ET STÉRÉOTYPES ROMANTIQUES

Abstract

Leopold von Sacher-Masoch, a German-language writer, was a great star of French literary life. The famous Revue des deux mondes devoted considerable space to him by publishing ten short stories entitled Slavic Women (Femmes slaves) in the period from 1889 to 1891. Sacher-Masoch emphasized that French was hissecond mother tongue, and some sourcesindicate that he wrote and published his texts directly in French. We propose to analyze Zarka the Dalmatian from the short story of the same name and Melitza the Montenegrin from the short story “A Day in Gatzko” (La journée de Gatzko), two female characters from the literary world of Leopold von Sacher-Masoch, presenting at the same time the atypical traits and stereotypes of the panoply of Slavic women placed at the center of the Masochian imagination. . Zarka and Melitza mix submission and intimate revolt in an oppressive environment for women; they integrate into it and keep their individualism while accepting and playing their model social and family roles. Leopold von Sacher-Masoch does not deprive them of the eroticism or romantic stereotypes specific to histime, while granting them a physical and moral finesse which protectsthem from the humiliations or violent and passionate reactions of their northern Slavic sisters. Neither of the two short stories contains masochistic elements as such, but they represent an essential contribution to the knowledge of Montenegrin and Dalmatian society of the 19th century,so close to each other and so distant to the visitorsto the Parisian salons which constitute the privileged audience of Leopold von Sacher Masoch. Despite partially substantiated criticisms of its colonial exoticism, Sacher-Masoch's study of Slavic women opens interesting avenues for feminist literary criticism.