num_pages: 352
description: This novel by Théophile Gautier (1811-1872) is the story of a young poet, d'Albert, who finds that the delightful youth with whom both he and his mistress fall in love is in fact Mademoiselle de Maupin in disguise.Through the equivocal passion of his heroine, and her ability to rouse such double passions, Gautier suggests that beauty may be loved independently of sex, and for its own sake. This theme and the doctrine of l'art pour l'art - of the sovereignty of art and its independence of moral and social conditions - wee to be central themes in his work. The preface to Mademoiselle de Maupin bears little relation to the novel, but it is Gautier's first and most impressive profession of l'art pour l'art. The novel itself is an expression of his passionate idealism, his eager, wholehearted worship of beauty. Mademoiselle de Maupin has an aesthetic significance. It is not merely the earliest and best-written of his novels: it is also the first, the most sustained, and one of the most brilliant of Gautier's professions of his creed.
language: English
title: Mademoiselle de Maupin
titlecomplete: Mademoiselle de Maupin
genres: Fiction, 19th Century, French Literature, Classics, France, Queer, Historical Fiction, Literature, Novels, LGBT
ratings_count: 1218
publisher: Penguin Books