TY - JOUR
AU - Israel Ross,, Andrew
AB - Timothy Verhoeven’s Sexual Crime, Religion and Masculinity in Fin-de-Siècle France: The Flamidien Affair explores the 1899 case of a priest accused of murdering and sexually abusing a young boy. Following the affair from the discovery of the crime through the case’s dismissal for lack of evidence, Sexual Crime, Religion and Masculinity reinterprets the relationship between religious belief, citizenship and Republicanism in the late nineteenth century—so often dominated by the Dreyfus Affair—through gender. In doing so, the book places masculinity at the centre of debates between Republican and Catholic visions of France as they played out outside Paris. Although the book also showcases some of the risks of microhistory, as it sometimes struggles to connect the specific case to its broader significance, it remains a valuable contribution to the literature and will be especially useful for introducing both undergraduate and graduate students to themes central to any course in French history, as well as the ways in which attention to gender complicates existing historical narratives. The introduction lays out the main claim of the book: the Flamidien Affair reveals the central role of gender in the ‘War of Two Frances’, as well as the deep fractures between Republican and Catholic visions of France in the late nineteenth century. Specifically, Verhoeven argues that both Republicans and Catholics levied visions of masculinity in order to defend their place in modern French politics and society. In Chapter 2, Verhoeven describes the discovery of the murder of twelve-year-old Gaston Foveaux, found after three days missing near the entrance to his school with a note that, among other things, attributed the ‘crime…to his [the murderer’s] “impure passion”’. Chapters 3 and 4 focus on the investigators. First, Verhoeven argues that the police inspector Charles Delalé, as a married man devoted to the Republic and to modern forensic methods, embodied Republican manhood. In the following chapter, the book further examines how forensic science was deployed to cast doubt on Flamidien’s manhood, as a celibate priest who not only was a suspected ‘pederast’, but also almost certainly ‘suffered’ from involuntary emissions. The Catholic response is described in Chapter 5. Rather than accept the gendered assault on Flamidien, the Church’s allies rallied to his defence by asserting Catholic masculinity in turn. According to Verhoeven, this defence came in three forms: ‘the appropriation of conventional masculine ideals’, the reinterpretation of Catholic practices—especially celibacy—as evidence of masculinity, and the ‘incorporat[ion of] ideals such as humility and resignation to God’s purpose’ in a masculine ethos that ‘resonated deeply within a religious worldview’. The final two chapters explore the ramifications of the affair on the debate between Republican and Catholic visions of the nation. Verhoeven situates the Flamidien Affair in light of national debates—by drawing on the comparison with the Dreyfus Affair and examining the late writings of Emile Zola—and successfully shows how Flamidien became a symbol for Republicans of Catholic perfidy and for Catholics of their own strength, as it ‘helped foster an atmosphere in which…punitive measures’ against Catholic education became ‘imperative’. Through archival research drawn from departmental, national and even international sources, Verhoeven constructs a fascinating tale. The central role of masculinity in the debate not only over Flamidien’s guilt or innocence, but also the broader conversation over the role of religious belief in the young French Third Republic becomes ever clearer as the book proceeds. Verhoeven’s emphasis on Catholicism specifically should propel historians of gender and sexuality to engage even more with religious belief. His discussion of the ways that the Church not only appropriated republican masculinity, but also attempted to construct its own vision within the parameters of Catholic belief is especially compelling in this regard. More evidence of the ways that the Affair became invested in a national discourse, coupled with a less static understanding of republican masculinity, would have complicated the analysis of both sides of the debate. Delalé’s successful performance of masculinity, for instance, seems to rest almost exclusively on the fact that he was married and had two children. The term ‘masculinity’ itself, in other words, could have been rendered a bit more unstable in order to show these debates both challenged and supported supposed gender norms. In addition, in light of the continuing scandal of sexual abuse within the Catholic Church, greater attention to the sexual aspects of the case would have deepened the argument about gender. Greater attention to Church views of sexual behaviour, desire and violence among the priesthood would have made the book even more timely. That these critiques rest on a desire for more speaks to the book’s fundamental success. Not only does Verhoeven manage to showcase the continuing need for scholars to more fully integrate gender into their work, but also the need for historians of gender and sexuality to pay closer attention to religion. I highly recommend this book not only to gender historians, but also to anyone interested in the political and cultural history of the early French Third Republic. © The Author(s) 2019. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the Society for the Study of French History. All rights reserved. For permissions, please e-mail: journals.permissions@oup.com This article is published and distributed under the terms of the Oxford University Press, Standard Journals Publication Model (https://academic.oup.com/journals/pages/open_access/funder_policies/chorus/standard_publication_model)
TI - Sexual Crime, Religion and Masculinity in Fin-de-Siècle France
JO - French History
DO - 10.1093/fh/crz011
DA - 2019-06-18
UR - https://www.deepdyve.com/lp/oxford-university-press/sexual-crime-religion-and-masculinity-in-fin-de-si-cle-france-P5zIMEFL0o
SP - 141
VL - 33
IS - 1
DP - DeepDyve
ER -