Indiana, George Sand's first solo novel, opens with the eponymous heroine brooding and bored in her husband's French countryside estate, far from her native Ile Bourbon (now Reunion). Written in 1832, the novel appeared during a period of French history marked by revolution and regime change, civil unrest and labor concerns, and slave revolts and the abolitionist movement, when women faced rigid social constraints and had limited rights within the institution of marriage. With this politically charged history serving as a backdrop for the novel, Sand brings together Romanticism, realism, and the idealism that would characterize her work, presenting what was deemed by her contemporaries a faithful and candid representation of nineteenth-century France. This volume gathers pedagogical essays that will enhance the teaching of Indiana and contribute to students' understanding and appreciation of the novel. The first part gives an overview of editions and translations of the novel and recommends useful background readings. Contributors to the second part present various approaches to the novel, focusing on four themes: modes of literary narration, gender and feminism, slavery and colonialism, and historical and political upheaval. Each essay offers a fresh perspective on Indiana, suited not only to courses on French Romanticism and realism but also to interdisciplinary discussions of French colonial history or law.
David A. Powell is professor of French in the Department of Romance Languages and Literatures at Hofstra University, USA. He is the author of While the Music Lasts: The Representation of Music in the Works of George Sand and has published critical editions of Jacques and Indiana. His articles on Sand have appeared in Romantic Review, and George Sand Studies; he has also published chapters in George Sand: Intertextualite et polyphonie, George Sand: Une ecriture experimentale, George Sand. Pratiques et imaginaires de l'ecriture, Novel Stages, George Sand: Ecritures et representations, Presences de l'Italie dans l'oeuvre de George Sand, and L'empire des signes. He has also published on nineteenth-century French literature, nineteenth- and twentieth-century Quebecois literature, representations of music in literature, and queer theory, as well as on musical resonances in Verlaine's and Mallarme's poetry. His current project is on queer narrative strategies in early-nineteenth-century novels. Pratima Prasad is associate professor of French at the University of Massachusetts, Boston, USA. She is the author of Colonialism, Race, and the French Romantic Imagination and the editor, with Susan McCready, of Novel Stages: Drama and the Novel in Nineteenth-Century France. Selected articles and essays include ""Intimate Strangers: Interracial Encounters in Romantic Narratives of Slavery"" (in L'Esprit Createur); ""L'insularite, 'l'indigenisme' et l'inceste dans Paul et Virginie"" (in L'autre en memoire [ed. Laporte]); ""Contesting Realism: Mimesis and Performance in George Sand's Novels"" (in XIX: Journal of the Society of Dix-Neuviemistes); ""Espace colonial et verite historique dans Indiana"" (in Etudes litteraires); ""Uncovering Narrative Convention in Sand's Lelia"" (in George Sand Studies); ""Displaced Performances: The Erotics of George Sand's Theatrical Space"" (in Romance Notes); and ""Deceiving Disclosures: Androgyny and George Sand's Gabriel"" (in French Forum).
"The preeminent woman writer of nineteenth-century France, George Sand, deserves a place in the MLA Approaches to Teaching World Literature series. This volume on Sand's Indiana is greatly needed not only because the novel is widely taught but also because it could be taught better--and this volume provides exciting new insights for teaching it." --Annabelle Rea, Occidental College
