| This dissertation lies at the intersection of fashion theory, gender studies, and literary and cultural criticism. The last three decades of the nineteenth century were characterized in France by the increase in mechanized industry, a rise in the popular press, and dramatic changes to women's roles in society. Within this changing climate, fashion became an important trope through which Paris-based writers explored, critiqued and conceptualized fin-de-siecle modernity.; Informed by the theoretical works of Judith Butler, Roland Barthes, Marjorie Garber, Adolf Loos and Thorstein Veblen this study argues that fashion, its evolution, its commercialization, and its textualization provided a discourse with which to talk about profound social and cultural changes associated with urban experience at the turn-of-the-century. As large industrialized department stores replaced smaller family-owned clothing boutiques, and the ready-to-wear fashion industry grew to be mainstream, commercial fashion writing in illustrated ladies' periodicals reached new heights of popularity and circulation.; Fashion periodicals are frequently overlooked as literary intertexts, yet these opulently decorated magazines inspired works by some of Belle Epoque France's most influential writers. Examining the ways in which feminine fashion and ladies' magazines infiltrated fin-de-siecle literature, these four dissertation chapters treat Symbolist poet Mallarme's fashion periodical La Derniere Mode (1874), novels by Decadent author Rachilde, serial fictions of the Naturalist novelist Zola, and the illustrated luxury fashion books by journalist Uzanne. |
