« The Angel in and out of the House » : configurations et transfiguration de l'espace public dans l'oeuvre d'Eliza W. Farnham (1815-1864).

This article presents an author and reformer whose name was famous in the nineteenth century but who has almost fallen into oblivion. Eliza W. Farnham (1815-1864) was a pioneer in many respects : as matron of the female division of Sing Sing prison in the 1840s, she introduced bold reforms based on phrenology, she was the first woman to publish a book on California in 1856 and, more than any other writer, she gave shape to the metaphor of the Angel in the House, arguing in her 1864 work, Woman and Her Era, that woman was a divine creature placed above the male sex. Her conception of the role and nature of the female sex, deeply anchored in the theory of separate spheres that prevailed in the nineteenth century, was at once traditional and revolutionary. While adhering to the belief that woman belonged in the home, she ultimately depicted man as the mere material provider of a semi-goddess whose mission was not only to domesticate and purify the male dominated political arena but also to transfigure society and the whole world thanks to her inner spiritual powers. This article, which focuses on the multifaceted notion of public sphere and on its treatment in Farnham's actions and works, seeks to highlight the complex and porous boundaries between public and private / internal and external that undermine, reassert and revisit the theory of separate spheres in order to promote a form of "apocalyptic feminism" (Helsinger). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]