“Where the Turbot Is King”: Murat's “Le Turbot” as Modern Fairy-centric Response to d'Aulnoy's “Le Dauphin”

• Main Author: Melissa A. Hofmann
• Language: English
• Published: Wayne State University Press 2021
• Subjects: 1805761:Aulnoy; Madame d' (Marie-Catherine); 1650 or 1651-1705:Personal Name; 75058:Murat; Henriette-Julie de Castelnau; comtesse de; 1670-1716:Personal Name; 1849496:Straparola; Giovanni Francesco; approximately 1480-1557?:Personal Name; 1177270:Women authors; French:Topic; 919916:Fairy tales:Topic; 1176947:Women > Social conditions:Topic; 1114649:Sex role in literature:Topic; 1018269:Metamorphosis in literature:Topic; 1090003:Rape in literature:Topic; 1114464:Sex in literature:Topic; Turbot
• Online Access: https://doi.org/10.17613/31m9-2e68

Comparing d’Aulnoy’s “Le Dauphin” and Murat’s “Le Turbot” relation to Straparola’s “Pietro the Fool” and to each other reveals the ways in which the conteuses’ rewriting of the tale allows for differing degrees of women’s control over (their) sexuality. D’Aulnoy and Murat both employ the trope of metamorphosis beyond their source tale’s transformation of the fool and add to the characters and plot in order to explore the issues of sexual consent, female desire and agency, and fidelity. I propose that Murat’s “Le Turbot” purposely engages “Le Dauphin” and fulfills the fairy/women writer ethos of Murat’s “Aux Fées Modernes.”