Description
Book SynopsisIn the nineteenth century, a fascination with the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints made Mormons and Mormonism a common trope in French journalism, art, literature, politics, and popular culture. Heather Belnap, Corry Cropper, and Daryl Lee bring to light French representations of Mormonism from the 1830s to 1914, arguing that these portrayals often critiqued and parodied French society. Mormonism became a pretext for reconsidering issues such as gender, colonialism, the family, and church-state relations while providing artists and authors with a means for working through the possibilities of their own evolving national identity. Surprising and innovative, Marianne Meets the Mormons looks at how nineteenth-century French observers engaged with the idea of Mormonism in order to reframe their own cultural preoccupations.
Trade Review"An interesting and convincing read." --
Association for Mormon Letters"Highly original, extremely interesting, and richly documented. The collection analyzed here is remarkable. A book that is superbly satisfying in terms of intellectual stimulation (because of its high erudition and in-depth analysis of how politics will impact cultural products), aesthetic curiosity, and humorous entertainment."--Bernadette Rigal-Cellard, author of
La Religion des Mormons"Belnap, Cropper, and Lee teach the reader much about French debates during the nineteenth century and how Mormonism highlighted those heated conversations. The authors deserve praise for writing such an interesting book about Mormonism outside of America." --
Journal of Mormon HistoryTable of ContentsAcknowledgments
Chronology of Key Publications and Events
Chapter 1. “Ils ont lâché le fou!”: Unleashing the Mormon Jester
Chapter 2. “La Loi nouvelle”: Mormonism and the Social Question in France
Chapter 3. Mormonism, Masculinity, and the Woman Question in Second Empire France
Chapter 4. Between Man and God: Mormons, Spiritualism, and the Occult
Chapter 5. From Page to Stage: Mormonism and the Woman Question in the Early Third Republic
Chapter 6. “Ces mœurs sont bien les nôtres!” Mormons, Marriage, and the Divorce Debate
Chapter 7. Exotic Mormons and the French Colonial Project
Chapter 8. “La Fin du Mormonisme”
Notes Bibliography
Index
