The first in a special seminar series co-organized by Charlotte Denoël (Bibliothèque nationale de France) & Nancy Thebaut (Oxford)

Christine de Pizan & Gender in the Late Middle Ages

This interdisciplinary seminar will be an interactive forum for thinking about the work of the French author Christine de Pizan (d. 1429/30) in anticipation of a forthcoming exhibition at the Bibliothèque nationale de France to commemorate the 600th anniversary of her death. Speakers will give short presentations followed by group discussion.

Please see below for abstracts & readings.

MT 2026 / / Wednesdays, 2 - 4:45 pm, Horton Room, Weston Library

***note that attendees will require a Bodleian card to access the Horton Room and that space is limited: please sign up via Eventbrite for each session**

Wednesday, Oct. 21 (week 2): Introductions

*Prof. Helen Swift (Oxford), “Encountering Christine de Pizan in 2026”

*Prof. Andrea Valentini (Université Sorbonne Nouvelle), « Lire les textes de Christine de Pizan autrement » (please note that Prof. Valentini’s presentation will be in French)

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RECOMMENDED READINGS

Wednesday, Oct. 21 (week 2)

*Prof. Helen Swift (Oxford), “Encountering Christine de Pizan in 2026”

Christine de Pizan has iconic status in medieval studies and in the histories of women’s writing and feminist thought. This status is wholly merited but also risks misrepresenting her position and her priorities. Framing her in exceptionalising and singularising terms runs counter to her emphasis on collectivity, relationality, and contingency. For Christine, all human life is positional – it can always turn otherwise, which is a state of both precarity and possibility. I invite us to recontextualise our readings of her most well-known texts today in order to highlight her commitment to thinking and writing change in the world.

Nota bene: Prof. Swift will be focusing primarily on La Cité des Dames and La Mutacion de Fortune

*Prof. Andrea Valentini (Univ. Sorbonne Nouvelle), « Lire les textes de Christine de Pizan autrement »

Dans la présente conférence, j’essaierai de proposer quelques sujets de réflexion autour de la Cité des dames et d’autres textes de Christine de Pizan inspirés d’une approche qui mêle philologie, linguistique et étude matérielle des manuscrits, y compris dans leur composante iconographique. Le but sera de montrer d’une part l’attention avec laquelle l’autrice composait ses œuvres et en suivait la diffusion, d’autre part les lectures que le public, même éloigné chronologiquement ou géographiquement, pouvait faire de celles-ci. Ce type de démarche peut enrichir de manière féconde des approches plus proprement littéraires ou bien inspirées des études de genre.

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A special seminar series co-organized by Charlotte Denoël (Bibliothèque nationale de France) & Nancy Thebaut (Oxford) // generously supported by TORCH

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Description supplied by the event organiser.