Helen Solterer, Professor of Romance Studies
Please note: Helen has left the "Jewish Studies Program Certificate" group at Duke University; some info here might not be up to date.
My research and teaching focus on premodern literature and culture in French and their interplay with contemporary thought; twentieth-century French cultural history; writing through gender.
I am currently completing, with the support of the Guggenheim Foundation, Timely Fictions in French, an almanac of premodern literary and graphic arts. Published works include: Migrants shaping Europe, past and present: Multilingual literatures, arts, and cultures, ed. with Vincent Joos (Manchester, forthcoming, 2022); James Joyce Remembered, edition 2022 (C.P. Curran), ed. with Alice Ryan (UCD, forthcoming, 2022); Un Moyen Âge républicain: les paradoxes du théâtre en temps de guerre (Presses Paris-Sorbonne, 2014) Medieval Roles for Modern Times (Penn State 2010); The Master and Minerva (California 1995); European Medieval Studies Under Fire, 1919-1945, an edited collection (JMEMS, Duke. 1995).
Students interested in researching premodern fiction in French are particularly welcome.
Office Location: | 217B Language Center, Durham, NC 27708 |
Email Address: | |
Web Page: | https://sites.duke.edu/solterer/ |
Teaching (Fall 2024):
- FRENCH 505P.01P, WHEN FICTION MEETS HISTORY
Synopsis
- Languages 305, W 11:45 AM-02:15 PM
- FRENCH 505S.01, WHEN FICTION MEETS HISTORY
Synopsis
- Languages 312, Tu 11:45 AM-02:15 PM
- (also cross-listed as ROMST 504S.01)
- Languages 312, Tu 11:45 AM-02:15 PM
- Office Hours:
- Wednesdays, 5-6 pm.
& by appt.
- Education:
Ph.D. University of Toronto (Canada) 1986 Boursière, Ambassade de France, Université de Paris VII 1983 Masters of Art University of Toronto 1981 Bachelor of Arts Georgetown University 1978 Year of Study University College of Dublin 1978
- Specialties:
-
French
Early Modern
European Studies
Performance Studies
Gender Studies, Feminism, Women Studies, Queer Studies
Historicism
- Research Interests:
Pre-modern French Literature and Culture; Theater; Gender Criticism; Modern French Cultural History
- Current Ph.D. Students
- Julie Singer
- Brooke Heidenreich Findley
- Daniel De Cillis
- Representative Publications
(More Publications)
- Solterer, H, Un Moyen Âge républicain : paradoxes du théâtre en temps de guerre (2014), Presses universitaires Paris-Sorbonne, (translated by Chénetier Alev, M.) [un-moyen-age-republicain]
- Solterer, H, Medieval Roles in Modern Times: Theater and the Battle for the French Republic (February, 2010), pp. 271 pages, 40 figures pages, The Pennsylvania State University Press
- Solterer, H, "Aimer un pays tout autre: Christine de Pizan, Alain Chartier, & Compagnie”, in Sens, Rhétorique, et Musique : Études réunies en hommage à Jacqueline Cerquiglini-Toulet, edited by Lefèvre, S; Lucken, C; Doudet, E (2015), pp. 769-782, Champion
- Solterer, H, Parcours d’un militant de théâtre: Moussa Abadi, in Le texte critique : expérimenter le théâtre et le cinéma aux XXe et XXIe siècles, edited by Alev, VVEMC (2013), pp. 207-220., Presses universitaires François-Rabelais
- Solterer, H; Dominguez, V, Réactivations scéniques, in Le Théâtre du XIIe au XIIe siècles, edited by Halévy, O; Parussa, G; Smith, D (2014), L’Avant-Scène
- Solterer, H, “Strange or Elegant or Foul Matter,”, Exemplaria, 25 (2013) (2013), pp. 79-92 (A Book-review essay.) [1041257312Z.00000000026]
- Solterer, H, Timely Fictions (2017)
- H. Solterer, "Love to Hate: A Premodern Legacy?" (2013)
- Solterer, H, Teaching Free Speech in Times of War, edited by I com, InsiderHigherEd.com (September, 2007)
- Solterer, H, The master and Minerva: Disputing women in French medieval culture (September, 2023), pp. 1-301, University of California Press, ISBN 9780520088351 (co-awarded The Modern Language Association Scaglione Prize, 1995.) [abs]
Helen Solterer received her PhD from the University of Toronto in 1986. Her research and teaching focus on medieval & early modern vernacular writing, modern cultural history, and contemporary theater. She has published The Master and Minerva: Disputing Women in French Medieval Culture (California, 1995), which won the MLA Scaglione Prize. Her current book, Playing for Life: Medieval Roles for Modern Times, explores the aesthetic, political and personal effects of the Middle Ages for the twentieth century. It has led to the essays "Gustave Cohen at Pont-Holyoke: The Drama of Belonging to France" (2005), "Performer le passé" in Paul Zumthor ou l’invention permanente. Critique, histoire, poésie (1998), and "European Medieval Studies Under Fire, 1919-45," a special issue of The Journal of Medieval and Early Modern Studies that she edited in 1997. She continues to write on free speech and verbal injury; essays include "The Freedoms of Fiction for Gender in Premodern France" (2002), and "Fiction vs. Defamation: The Quarrel over the Romance of the Rose" Medieval History Journal (1999).