ABSTRACT
‘Hélisenne de Crenne’ appears to have been a pseudonym used by Marguerite Briet, a French noblewoman and novelist. Her sentimental novel Les Angoisses douloureuses qui procèdent d’amours (The Torments of Love, 1538) was the first French novel by a woman to have been printed. The first part of the work is the story of Hélisenne, a noblewoman who is married off at a very young age in an arranged marriage but who falls desperately in love with a young commoner whom she sees from her house. When her husband confines her to one of his country manors (or château), the heroine decides to write her story in the hope that it will reach her beloved. Whilst Les Angoisses douloureuses qui procèdent d’amours is a cautionary tale about the perils of love and its effects on reason and the body, the author also voices praise of love via numerous characters. The format of a polite dialogue in which two parties debate the merits of love was inspired by similar dialogues in ancient and medieval sources.
