Knowledge Bank

In the late eighteenth century, there was a lot of anxiety going because people were trying to figure out who they were supposed to be and how their relationships should reflect that. In 1782 France, before the French Revolution, Pierre Chonderlos de Laclos published his seduction novel Dangerous Liaisons, which tells the story of a friendship/partnership of a male and female aristocratic seducers and how their friendship destroys each other. The friendship between Valmont (man) and Merteuil (woman) did not last because crossing gender roles to have the other sex's characteristics were not going to work and the social order would eventually come back and punish Valmont and Merteuil. In a post-American Revolution America, the Americans were just as anxious about gender roles being switched and trying to figure out how to make the country work. In 1799, Charles Brockden Brown published his seduction novel Ormond, which tells the story of a pair of women holding onto their friendship in the face of adversity for Constantia while her friend, Sophia, helps her out the best can, especially when the seducer, Ormond, comes into the story. The same anxieties over gender role crossing is present as well, but the female friendship is successful because they have each other to rely on than turning against each other as Valmont and Merteuil did in Dangerous Liaisons.