Call for Articles: Forum for Modern Language Studies - Representations of Age in European Literatures

[Claire Whitehead]

Dear All,

I would like to draw your attention to the Call for Articles below for a
Special Issue of the journal Forum for Modern Language Studies dedicated to
'Representations of Age in European Literatures'.

Abstracts should be sent to my colleague Joy Charnley at:
j.charnley at phonecoop.coop


Forum for Modern Language Studies

Special Issue: Representations of Age in European Literatures

Call for articles

In her 1970 work about perceptions and representations of age in different
cultures and literatures, La Vieillesse, Simone de Beauvoir remarked that
‘le vieillard n’est pas un bon héros de roman; il est achevé, figé, sans
attente, sans espoir; pour lui les jeux sont faits’. Thinking more
specifically about old women and the ways in which aging is different for
them, Anne-Marie Houdebine-Gravaud has said that ‘le mot “vieillard” existe
mais non le terme “vieillarde” [...] C’est qu’une femme ne devrait jamais
vieillir’ (1999). Many writers have however quite deliberately placed older
characters at the centre of their work and in 2006 two such novels in French
met with commercial success (Benoite Groult, La Touche étoile, Héléna
Marienské, Rhésus). In this context, this Special Issue seeks to look at the
ways in which age has been perceived and represented, both negatively and
positively in European Literatures. Was Beauvoir right? What stereotypes
about older people have been attacked or reinforced in literature? Have
writers often seen age as a barrier between generations and how has the
‘generation gap’ been represented? What place is there/has there
traditionally been in European literatures for older people? How is old age
different/perceived as different for women? Have different cultures
approached it in noticeably diverse ways?

Proposals for articles in English (300 words) should be sent as soon as
possible to the guest editor Joy Charnley (j.charnley at phonecoop.coop) who
will be happy to respond to any queries. Completed articles will need to be
submitted by September 2010 and publication is planned for April 2011.
Articles should be up to 5,000 words, including endnotes, and must conform
to the FMLS stylesheet (see the FMLS website).

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