Gender and Cultural Mediation in the Long Eighteenth Century: Women across Borders (New Transculturalisms, 1400–1800)

“Gender and Cultural Mediation in the Long Eighteenth Century consti-tutes a major contribution to the field of Eighteenth-Century Studies, women writers and cultural mediators. It thoroughly changes our perspec-tive on how the Enlightenment functioned and how ideas moved. A prime example of multidisciplinary research, it deftly combines trans-media studies, translation studies, cultural studies, book history, and material culture to document platforms of exchange and interaction among women that reflected new forms of sociability and the circula-tion of knowledge beyond elite spaces. In his ground-breaking Placing the Enlightenment, Charles Withers’ intention to chart enlightened flows of knowledge through the geography of Enlightenment is fulfilled in this volume and expanded by adding the dimension of gender. The new knowledge about the long eighteenth century produced here forces us to confront old tropes and revisit studies and assumptions that have been proven to be erroneous. This book is destined to become a classic and a beacon.” Praise for Gender and Cultural Mediation in the Long Eighteenth Century 7 Contents 9 Editors and Contributors 12 About the Editors 12 Contributors 13 List of Figures 17 List of Tables 19 1 Towards a Gendered, Decentred History of Cultural Mediation in the Eighteenth Century 20 Crossing Borders: Concepts, Actors and Geographies 21 Gender and Cultural Mediation: An Overview of the Book 32 Gender, Modernities, and the Global Enlightenment: Final Remarks 40 References 44 Part I Discussing Gender in Transnational and Transatlantic Settings 53 2 Discussing Gender, Discussing Modernities in the Global Enlightenment: The Many Lives of a Spanish Defence of Women in Europe and America 54 Moving in Time and Space 54 France: Between Erudition and mondanité 59 Britain: The Long Shadow of the Black Legend 63 The Italian Peninsula. Connections with Aristocratic and Curial Contexts 70 Portugal. Equality vs. Complementarity 74 Creole Readings 77 Conclusion: Faces of Modernity 81 References 82 3 “Man, Secluded from the Company of Women, Is... a Dangerous Animal to Society”: The History of Women in Scotland’s Enlightenment 90 Introduction 90 Civilising Woman 94 Geography of Civilisation 99 Limits of Feminisation 104 Conclusion 108 References 109 4 Gender and Education in Eighteenth-century Spanish American Newspapers 115 Mercurio peruano: Educating Women 116 Papel Periódico de Santafe de Bogotá: Women and Education 123 Concluding Remarks: The Long Eighteenth Century 131 References 133 Part II Women of Letters Across Frontiers 136 5 Female Faces in the Fraternity. Printed Portraits Galleries and the Construction and Circulation of Images of Learned Women in the Republic of Letters 137 The Republic of Faces: Embodying Intellectual Authority in the Republic of Letters 140 Female Faces in the Fraternity: Including Learned Women in the Bilder-Sal 143 Disappointing Displays: The Continuing Struggle to Visualize Female Scholars 150 “I Hope it Finds Its Way to Every Studyroom”. The Bilder-Sal’s Circulation 153 References 159 6 A Woman Between Two Cities: Louise d’Épinay, Paris and Geneva 164 Montbrillant and Character 168 Character 171 Between Paris and Geneva 174 Stoicism 178 Conclusion 180 References 182 7 Language, Gender and Authority in the Letters of Isabelle de Charrière 184 Self-representation and Multilingualism 186 Letters to Boswell 189 Letters to Huber 193 Conclusion 199 References 201 Part III Rewriting Through Translation 204 8 Elsewhere. Women Translators and Travellers in Europe and the Mediterranean Basin in the Age of Enlightenment 205 Introduction. Travel, Translate, Transfer 205 “Outward Bound” Into New Worlds and Cultures 210 “En Philosophe, en Poète, en Femme Aimable et en Bel-esprit” 212 En Route to the Levant 219 Conclusion. Many Modes of Translation and Transposition: Women Travellers and Painters 225 References 229 9 Translating Genre and Gender for Madrid Audiences: The Case of María Rosa de Gálvez 234 Introduction: Genre and Gender 234 María Rosa de Gálvez’s Social and Literary Connections, and Rejections 239 An Early Translation from the French: Catalina (1801) 242 The Box-Office and Artistic Success of Bion (1803) 244 Adaptation and Transformation in El egoísta (1804) 246 Conclusion: Circulating Genre and Gender 251 References 253 10 The Role of Women in Translation History: Translating and Collaborating in the Re-shaping of Italy in the Early Romantic Period 257 Introduction 257 The Target Cultural System: The Italian Literary Scene 258 Bianca Milesi Mojon: A Woman Translator of Educational Literature 263 Prime Lezioni: Translation or Adaptation? 269 The Translator’s Voice 272 Conclusion 274 References 275 11 Trans-Adriatic Enlightenments: Maria Petrettini’s Italian Translation of the Turkish Embassy Letters 279 Introduction 279 “A Race of Most Secret Companions” 281 The Translation of the Turkish Embassy Letters 285 Conclusions 291 References 293 Part IV Mediating Knowledge, Making Publics 297 12 Women’s Libraries and “Women’s Books”, 1729–1830 298 The MEDIATE Database 299 Printed Female-owned Library Catalogues: Methodological Issues 301 Female Libraries and the Bibliothèque choisie 307 From Subject Categories to Individual Authors 310 “Women’s Books”: Devotional Works and Novels 313 Women’s Libraries as a Space of Female Intimacy 317 References 321 13 The Production and Circulation of Literature for Women Between Europe and America: A Perspective from the Hispanic-American World 324 Introduction 324 The Circulation of Books and Ideas Between Spain and Mexico 327 On Women, Literature and Reading in Spanish America 331 Intercontinental Circulation of Books for Women: Some Examples 336 Conclusions 339 References 342 14 Women and Novels: Educating the Female Public in the Age of Enlightenment 347 Gender and Reading: Women and Fragile Readers 347 Of the Fate of Women Who Read livres philosophiques: The Case of Emirena 352 Conclusion 364 References 365 Index 371 This series, now published by Palgrave Macmillan, presents studies of early modern contacts and exchanges among the states, polities, cultures, religions, and entrepreneurial organizations of Europe; Asia, including the Levant and East India/Indies; Africa; and the Americas. Books in New Transculturalisms will continue to investigate diverse figures, such as travelers, merchants, cultural inventors-explorers, mapmakers, artists, craftsmen, and writers-as they operated in political, mercantile, sexual, affective, and linguistic economies. We encourage authors to reflect on their own methodologies in relation to issues and theories relevant to the study of transculturalism, translation, and transnationalism. New Transculturalisms is proud to have published Jennifer Linhart Wood's Sounding Otherness in Early Modern Drama and Travel: Uncanny Vibrations in the English Archive, winner of the MRDS 2021 Bevington Award for Best New Book. This open access book explores the transnational and transoceanic dimensions of the debate on gender and women's cultural agency and mediation in the long eighteenth century. It aims to decenter perspectives on traditional Enlightenment geographies, by emphasizing cultural transfers between Southern Europe and the rest of Europe, as well as with the Americas; by focusing on a variety of cultural mediators―women authors, female (and male) translators, readers, travelers, and disseminators; and by examining diverse written and visual sources―from correspondence, travel narratives, and philosophical essays, to novels, opera, portraits.