ABSTRACT
In opposition to the narrow social position which the government attempted to assign politically to women in interwar France, educational and professional opportunities for musiciennes were surprisingly well developed, and many pursued careers. As with the significant degree of both covert and overt resistance to the contemporary conservative politics – exemplified by the low birth rate, high number of women in employment, and development of feminism, discussed in chapter one – that so many musiciennes were professionally active provides further evidence of the French government’s failure to restrict women to the domestic sphere. Paris had, of course, functioned as an important musical centre for female musicians, both French and international, since at least the seventeenth century. Women such as Antonia Bembo (1640-1720), Elisabeth-Claude Jacquet de la Guerre (16651729), Louise Farrenc (1804-1875), Augusta Holmès (1847-1903), and Lili Boulanger (1893-1918) worked as composers, whilst just a small selection of star performers included Marguerite-Antoinette Couperin (1705-1778), Marie Favart (1727-1772), Amélie-Julie Candeille (1767-1834), Louise Dugazon (1755-1821), Marie Pleyel (1811-1875), and Pauline Viardot (1821-1910).1 Thus the musiciennes of the interwar period fitted within both a long established tradition of women being professionally active within the musical arena and an environment which was broadly supportive of their presence. From composition to pedagogy, through conducting and performance, women flourished within every musical field. Beyond music, interwar Paris appeared to act like a magnet upon talented female practitioners across all the arts. Marie Laurencin (1883-1956), Hélène Perdriat (1894-1969), Tamara de Lempicka (1898-1980), and Dora Maar (1907-1997) all pursued active careers in the visual arts; female writers, meanwhile, included Colette (1873-1954), Gertrude Stein (1874-1946), and Maria Jolas (1893-1987).2 This chapter considers the educational and professional opportunities available to musiciennes in interwar France, and also assesses the career restrictions which they continued to face despite the largely supportive context in which they worked, including discrimination from publishers and gendered criticism. This, in some ways contradictory, situation directly mirrors the wider gender struggles and paradoxes of interwar France (discussed in chapter one).
