Whimsical Pornography: Albert Dubout\u27s Illustrations for Sade\u27s Justine

In Dangereux supplement: I \u27illustration du roman en France au dixhuitieme siecle, Christophe Martin explains that images were generally considered to be dangerous additions to a text, because they could not be limited to their intended primary purpose: to provide a visual translation for characters and events depicted in works of fiction.1 For even as they illustrate, images also offer a reading that necessarily shapes the reader\u27s perception of a novel. In the process, the images themselves become texts with their own complex system of signification. As such supplements go, illustrations of Donatien Alphonse Francois de Sade\u27s novels are perhaps among the most dangerous. To the extent that they tum into images a fictional world that is often downright pornographic, they carry with them the possibility of making the universe of the infamous Marquis accessible and appealing to those who might otherwise be put off by his philosophical digressions or by the sheer length of his books. The engravings published as part of Sade\u27s works at the end of the eighteenth century were deemed to be such a threat to good morals that they remained in L \u27Enfer of the Bibliotheque Nationale for almost two hundred years, until Michel Delon \u27s edition for the Pleiade Collection. in the 1990s made them more widely available.

The Other Rise of the Novel in Eighteenth- Century French Fiction

The rise of the novel paradigm—and the underlying homology between the rise of a bourgeois middle class and the coming of age of a new literary genre—continues to influence the way we analyze economic discourse in the eighteenth-century French novel. Characters are often seen as portraying bourgeois values, even when historiographical evidence points to the virtual absence of a self-conscious and coherent bourgeoisie in France in the early modern period. Likewise, the fact that the nobility was a dynamic and diverse group whose members had learned to think in individualistic and meritocratic terms as a result of courtly politics is often ignored. The Other Rise of the Novel calls for a radical revision of how realism, the language of self-interest and commercial exchanges, and idealized noble values interact in the early modern novel. It focuses on two novels from the seventeenth century, Furetière’s Roman bourgeois and Lafayette’s Princesse de Clèves and four novels from the eighteenth century, Prévost’s Manon Lescaut, Graffigny’s Lettres d’une Péruvienne, Rousseau’s La Nouvelle Héloïse and Sade’s Les infortunes de la vertu. It argues that eighteenth-century French fiction does not reflect material culture mimetically and that character action is best analyzed by focusing on the social and discursive exchanges staged by the text, rather than by trying to create parallels between specific behavior and actual historical changes. The novel produces its own reality by transforming characters and their stories into alternative social models, different articulations of how individuals should define their economic relations to others. The representation of interpersonal relations often highlights personal conceptions of private interest that cannot be easily reconciled with the traditional narrative of a transition towards economic modernity. Realism, then, is not only about verisimilar storytelling and psychological depth: it is an epistemological questioning about the type of access to reality that a particular genre can give its readers.https://scholarship.richmond.edu/bookshelf/1237/thumbnail.jp

The Prostitute as Neo-Manager: Sade\u27s Juliette and the New Spirit of Capitalism

In fact, Juliette\u27s actions reveal a fundamental truth about the underlying social and economic structures of Sade\u27s universe: the existence of two different groups, one composed of exploiters who are mobile, adaptable and connected, and the other formed by the exploited, who are condemned to a life of suffering and vagabondage. This division is also characteristic of what theorists have called \u27modern network economies\u27 and my analysis will explore the continuities between prostitution in Sade\u27s fictional society and the nature of the post-industrial world as described by the French sociologists Luc Boltanski and Eve Chiapello in a recent study, Ihe New Spirit of Capitalism. I will draw on their description of \u27neo-managers\u27 and \u27connectionist spaces\u27 as two crucial components of modern capitalism to show how Juliette\u27s identity as a venal body is a function of the social connections that she chooses to pursue. Sade\u27s heroine, in her successive attempts to attract new potential clients and to extract everything she can from them, is depicted as a deft manager of her body and of her relations with other economic actors. Not only does she seem to possess an instinctive knowledge of what drives success in Sade\u27s social world, she also has an uncanny ability to avoid being punished for her crimes. This essay suggests that Juliette\u27s successful negotiation of her adventures shares characteristics with Boltanski and Chiapello\u27s account of those who succeed in advanced capitalist societies, and that libertine modes of behaviour prefigure a number of features of what they designate as network societies

[Introduction to] Wim Wenders: Making Films That Matter

Wim Wenders: Making Films That Matter is the first book in 15 years to take a comprehensive look at Wim Wenders\u27s extensive filmography. In addition to offering new insights into his cult masterpieces, the 10 essays in this volume highlight the thematic and aesthetic continuities between his early films and his latest productions. Wenders\u27s films have much to contribute to current conversations on intermediality, whether it be through his adaptations of important literary works or his filmic reinventions of famous paintings by Edward Hopper or Andrew Wyeth. Wenders has also positioned himself as a decidedly transnational and translingual filmmaker taking on the challenge of representing peripheral spaces without falling into the trap of a neo-colonial gaze. Making Films That Matter argues that Wenders remains a true innovator in both his experiments in 3D filmmaking and his attempts to define a visual poetics of peace. Please download the Introduction from the link above. You may purchase this book directly from the publisher from the link below.https://scholarship.richmond.edu/bookshelf/1380/thumbnail.jp

IL-1β and IL-6 modulate apolipoprotein E gene expression in rat hepatocyte primary culture

Incubation of rat hepatocytes in primary culture with IL-1β at a concentration of 2.5 units/ml resulted in an increase (+80%) in the amount of apoE mRNA without any effect upon apoE synthesis. IL-6 at a low concentration (10 units/ml) induced a decrease (−35%) in the amount of apoE mRNA, but increased apoE synthesis (+28%). No effect was observed with higher concentrations of IL-1β (10 units/ml) or IL-6 (100 units/ml). These results suggest that inflammatory cytokines IL-1β and IL-6 modulate the expression of apoE gene in cultured rat hepatocytes, at a concentration that does not induce the acute phase response

Reconnaissance de dette : don et centre-don dans Histoire d\u27Ernestine de Marie Riccoboni

Qu’est-ce qu\u27un roman comme Histoire d\u27 Ernestine, mineur même dans l\u27œuvre de Marie Riccoboni, peut-il bien nous apprendre sur l\u27anagnorisis aristotélicienne? Après tout, une histoire d \u27amour qui se conclut par un mariage entre un riche aristocrate et une jeune orpheline au revenus modestes et d\u27une honnêteté indiscutable ne défraye pas la chroniq ue de l\u27univers romanesque du dix-huitième siècle. Deux mots pour apporter un début de réponse: ignorance et noblesse, deux mots étymologiquement liés au morphème grec \u27gno\u27 qui signifie savoir, connaissance, morphème que nous retrouvons bien sur dans anagnorisis. Histoire d\u27 Ernestine est le récit d\u27une jeune fille éduquée dans la petite bourgeoisie artisanale parisienne et qui ne sait pas déchiffrer lcs liens qui se tissent à son insu dans un milieu qui lui est étranger, celui de la noblesse parisienne. En effet, au dix–huitième siccle, le noble, étymologiquement, c\u27est celui qui sait: connaissance et classe sociale ne font qu\u27une. La force du roman de Marie Riccoboni, c\u27est de donner a l\u27anagnorisis, conçue ici comme reconnaissance,une dimension économique. Plus qu\u27une simple technique narrative,la problématique de la reconnaissance permet de mieux comprendreIa relation des personnages du roman à leur ethos de classe - c\u27est-à-direà Ia manière dont ils perçoivent les structures économiques de leur environnement social et la façon dont ils agissent par rapport à ces structures. Plus précisément, la reconnaissance de dette permet de mieux percevoir les relations entre anagnorisis comme technique narrative et anagnorisis comme element qui explique les liens sociaux entre les personnages. La réalisation d\u27être lié, même à son insu, par un échange, ne peut être séparée d\u27une autre forme de reconnaissance: comment rendre ce qui a été donné. Ainsi, la difficulté de reconnaître ses dettes pousse la logique de Ia générosité aristocratiquc a ses limites en la confrontant à un système d\u27échange réciproque où ce qui est donné doit être rendu

Age and environment affect constitutive immune function in Red Knots (Calidris canutus)

We studied subspecies, age and environmental effects on constitutive immune function (natural antibody and complement titres, haptoglobin activity and leukocyte concentrations) in Red Knots (Calidris canutus). We compared C. c. islandica and C. c. canutus in the Wadden Sea and found no difference in immune function between subspecies. However, C. c. canutus on their wintering grounds in Banc d’Arguin had higher natural antibody and lower complement levels than C. c. canutus or C. c. islandica in the Wadden Sea. This suggests that immune function is determined more by the surrounding environment than by subspecies. We also compared age classes in the Wadden Sea and found that first year birds had significantly lower natural antibody levels than adults, but that second year birds no longer differed from adults. Finally, we examined the interaction of age and environment in Banc d’Arguin. We found that first year birds (but not adults) in a low quality habitat had higher leukocyte concentrations than first year birds or adults in a high quality habitat. Differences in available resources and defence needs between environments, and differences among individuals differentially distributed between sites, are likely important contributors to the variation in immune function we report. Future studies, which examine these factors on wild birds, will be important for our understanding of how animals function in their natural environment.

Effects of immune supplementation and immune challenge on oxidative status and physiology in a model bird:implications for ecologists

One route to gain insight into the causes and consequences of ecological differentiation is to understand the underlying physiological mechanisms. We explored the relationships between immunological and oxidative status and investigated how birds cope physiologically with the effects of immune-derived oxidative damage. We successively implemented two experimental manipulations to alter physiological status in a model bird species: the homing pigeon (Columba livia). The first manipulation, an immune supplementation, was achieved by oral administration of lysozyme, a naturally occurring and non-specific antimicrobial enzyme. The second manipulation, an immune challenge, took the form of an injection with lipopolysaccharide, a bacterial endotoxin. Between groups of lysozyme-treated and control birds, we compared lipopolysaccharide-induced changes in reactive oxygen metabolites, total antioxidant capacity, haptoglobin, oxygen consumption, body mass and cloacal temperature. Lysozyme supplementation intensified the lipopolysaccharide-induced inflammatory response and generated short-term oxidative and metabolic costs. We identified significant interactions between immune supplementation and immune challenge in terms of reactive oxygen metabolites, haptoglobin and oxygen consumption. Our study provides alternative interpretations of differences in oxidative and immunological indices and demonstrates that these indices can also fluctuate and interact across very short time scales, reflecting something akin to current ‘health status’ or ‘physiological condition’. These ephemeral effects highlight the need to broadly consider current physiological condition when drawing conclusions that relate physiology to ecology and evolution

Sensing of Dietary Lipids by Enterocytes: A New Role for SR-BI/CLA-1

BACKGROUND: The intestine is responsible for absorbing dietary lipids and delivering them to the organism as triglyceride-rich lipoproteins (TRL). It is important to determine how this process is regulated in enterocytes, the absorptive cells of the intestine, as prolonged postprandial hypertriglyceridemia is a known risk factor for atherosclerosis. During the postprandial period, dietary lipids, mostly triglycerides (TG) hydrolyzed by pancreatic enzymes, are combined with bile products and reach the apical membrane of enterocytes as postprandial micelles (PPM). Our aim was to determine whether these micelles induce, in enterocytes, specific early cell signaling events that could control the processes leading to TRL secretion. METHODOLOGY/PRINCIPAL FINDINGS: The effects of supplying PPM to the apex of Caco-2/TC7 enterocytes were analyzed. Micelles devoid of TG hydrolysis products, like those present in the intestinal lumen in the interprandial period, were used as controls. The apical delivery of PPM specifically induced a number of cellular events that are not induced by interprandial micelles. These early events included the trafficking of apolipoprotein B, a structural component of TRL, from apical towards secretory domains, and the rapid, dose-dependent activation of ERK and p38MAPK. PPM supply induced the scavenger receptor SR-BI/CLA-1 to cluster at the apical brush border membrane and to move from non-raft to raft domains. Competition, inhibition or knockdown of SR-BI/CLA-1 impaired the PPM-dependent apoB trafficking and ERK activation. CONCLUSIONS/SIGNIFICANCE: These results are the first evidence that enterocytes specifically sense postprandial dietary lipid-containing micelles. SR-BI/CLA-1 is involved in this process and could be a target for further study with a view to modifying intestinal TRL secretion early in the control pathway