''Le Livre de la mutation de fortune'' is a 1403 poem by Christine de Pizan. It is a universal history that tells the story of how Fortune has affected events. The frame narrative describes the process of the narrator's transformation into a man following the death of their husband and, as such, is an early text concerning

gender transition Gender transition is the process of changing one's gender presentation or sex characteristics to accord with one's internal sense of gender identity – the idea of what it means to be a man or a woman,Brown, M. L. & Rounsley, C. A. (1996) ''True ...

Background

Christine de Pizan's husband, Étienne du Castel, died in 1389, leaving her to support her mother and her children as a court writer. Her work emphasizes how learning comforted her after his death.

Description

Christine de Pizan completed this poem of 23,636 verses in 1403. The narrator of the text explains how they became a man after the death of their husband to become a writer, an occupation considered masculine. The narrator asserts their male identity, making the text an early account of

transgender A transgender (often abbreviated as trans) person is someone whose gender identity or gender expression does not correspond with their sex assigned at birth. Many transgender people experience dysphoria, which they seek to alleviate through ...

representation in

French medieval literature Medieval French literature is, for the purpose of this article, Medieval literature written in Oïl languages (particularly Old French and early Middle French) during the period from the eleventh century to the end of the fifteenth century. The ...

:Vous diray qui je suis :Qui de femelle devint masle :Par fortune qu'ainsi le voult :Si me mua et corps et voult :En homme naturel parfaict : :Et jadis fut femme de fait :Homme suis je ne mens pas,

Before addressing the subject of their transformation, the narrator cites two other cases of women being transformed into men:

Tiresias In Greek mythology, Tiresias (; grc, Τειρεσίας, Teiresías) was a blind prophet of Apollo in Thebes, famous for clairvoyance and for being transformed into a woman for seven years. He was the son of the shepherd Everes and the nym ...

and Yplis (the Roman poet

Ovid Pūblius Ovidius Nāsō (; 20 March 43 BC – 17/18 AD), known in English as Ovid ( ), was a Roman poet who lived during the reign of Augustus. He was a contemporary of the older Virgil and Horace, with whom he is often ranked as one of the th ...

's Iphis). The author and the narrator share the same name: Christine. The text lists the successive transformations made by the character of Fortune. The narrator indicates that they were transformed into a man by Fortune after their husband died in a shipwreck when they were 25 years old and already a mother. They assert that 13 years later, they are and remain a man. Their poem is therefore an early account of

. Fortune performed the metamorphosis by touching every part of the narrator's body, until they completely became a man. They also claim to be in every way like their father, resembling him, except for their gender assigned at birth. This transformation of the narrator, contrary to the metamorphosis described in ''

L'Ovide moralisé The ''Metamorphoses'' ( la, Metamorphōsēs, from grc, μεταμορφώσεις: "Transformations") is a Latin narrative poem from 8 CE by the Roman poet Ovid. It is considered his '' magnum opus''. The poem chronicles the history of the w ...

'', takes place from the outside, the appearance of the narrator becoming conform to their inner male soul. The narrator indicates that they use metaphors in their story, which they think does not exclude the truth. In the explanatory comments inserted between sections of the text, the writer indicates that the narrator is "a person", and that the text tells how they served Fortune and conducted themself. The narrator indicates that they were assigned female at birth: "fus nee fille, sanz fable".

Posterity

Some of the miniatures in the book inspired works from

Robinet Testard Robinet Testard (fl. 1470–1531) was a French medieval illuminator and painter, whose works are difficult to attribute since none of them was signed or dated. He is known to have worked for the family of Charles, Count of Angoulême (1459–9 ...

and Jean Pichore who worked for

Louise of Savoy Louise of Savoy (11 September 1476 – 22 September 1531) was a French noble and regent, Duchess ''suo jure'' of Auvergne and Bourbon, Duchess of Nemours, and the mother of King Francis I. She was politically active and served as the regent of F ...

, among them the face of the goddess or the horizontal wheel.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Livre de la mutation de fortune 1403 books French non-fiction books Medieval French literature Feminist fiction Allegory Transgender literature LGBT poetry

Background

Description

Posterity

See also

References