SOURCE: Thomas, Shelley. “The Prostitute/Mother in Maupassant's ‘Yvette.’” Esprit Createur 39, no. 2 (summer 1999): 74-84.

In the following essay, Thomas considers Maupassant's portrayal of woman as virgin/mother/whore in “Yvette.”

Nineteenth-century French literature was particularly prolific in fostering the notion of the dichotomized female: on the one hand a whore, on the other, a Madonna. Included in the term Madonna is both the virgin and the mother, for she was both pure and a maternal figure. When an author focuses on one element or another, he fragments womankind, denying, in effect, the possibility of integration and wholeness. In addition, he may validate one fragment over another, creating a hierarchy that further destroys the notion of an integral wholeness and results in marginalizing the female. A tripartite hierarchy of virgin/mother/whore is very clearly exemplified in Maupassant's “Yvette.” Recent criticism that deals with women in literature has sought...