- Title
- Sappho in the Salons
- Creator
- Johnson, Marguerite
- Relation
- Remembering Paris in Text and Film p. 59-76
- Publisher
- Intellect
- Resource Type
- book chapter
- Date
- 2021
- Description
- This chapter discusses two major figures of the Parisian Left Bank in the twentieth century: Natalie Clifford Barney and Gertrude Stein. It focuses on the homes of both women and the significance of them for the creation of sexual and artistic freedom. It underlines the stories of Barney and Stein with that of Sappho and employs the figure of the Greek poet as both lesbian icon and source of artistic inspiration. In this sense, it seeks to achieve somewhat of a blending or merging of Sappho – lesbian and poet – with Barney and Stein – lesbians and poets. As Mytilene is a source of personal and creative nourishment for Sappho, this chapter also traces the Parisian Left Bank as providing the same nurturing environment for the ex-patriot Americans. It is, in many ways, a response to my chapter on Baudelaire and Sappho (Chapter 2 above). Naturally, therefore, memory and nostalgia also feature here, but in very different ways. While Baudelaire invoked the ancient poets as a means of mentally, emotionally and creatively rescuing Paris from rejuvenation (at least in his own mind, or soul), Barney sought to bring Mytilene into her Parisian homes, reflective of some form of romantic sorcery on her part to materialize a nostalgic but false memory of a lesbian utopia on a dreamy Greek island. Stein would have none of this nonsense. Nevertheless, she is, whether she would ever admit it or not, inadvertently embracing a Sapphic enclave of her own. With Sappho as a presence throughout this chapter, emerging consistently in Barney’s artistic endeavours, the analysis that follows also explores the female creative process, and some of its outputs in the case of Barney and Stein, to flesh out a picture of lesbian writing on the Left Bank.
- Subject
- Sappho; Paris; poetry; artistic freedom
- Identifier
- http://hdl.handle.net/1959.13/1433746
- Identifier
- uon:39345
- Identifier
- ISBN:9781789384185
- Language
- eng
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