’when Familiar Meanings Dissolve...’: Essays in French Studies in Memory of Malcolm Bowie

This volume commemorates the work of Malcolm Bowie, who died in 2007. It includes selected papers drawn from the conference held in his memory at the Institute of Germanic & Romance Studies, University of London, in May 2008, inspired by his work in nineteenth- and twentieth-century French literature. Malcolm Bowie was instrumental in shaping French studies in the United Kingdom into the interdisciplinary field it now is. The contributions to this collection are grouped around Bowie's principal interests and specialisms: poetry, Proust, theory, visual art and music. The book is, however, more than a memorial to Malcolm Bowie's work and legacy. In its inclusion of work by established and eminent members of the academic profession as well as new and emerging scholars, it is also a showcase for cutting-edge work in French studies in the United Kingdom and beyond.

Naomi Segal is Professorial Fellow at Birkbeck, University of London. From 2004 to 2011 she was founding director of the Institute of Germanic & Romance Studies. She has served on or chaired many national and international committees. She has published over seventy articles and twelve books, of which the most recent are Consensuality: Didier Anzieu, Gender and the Sense of Touch (2009), Indeterminate Bodies (2003), Le Désir à l’OEuvre (2000) and André Gide: Pederasty and Pedagogy (1998).
Gill Rye is Professor Emerita and Associate Fellow at the Institute of Germanic & Romance Studies, University of London, where she is director of the Centre for the Study of Contemporary Women’s Writing. She is author of Narratives of Mothering (2009), Reading for Change (2001) and numerous articles and chapters on women’s writing. She was managing editor of the Journal of Romance Studies from 2000 until 2010.