Villette · Chapter
The Cleopatra explained
Lucy Snowe enjoys a prolonged stay at La Terrasse with the Brettons, where she explores Villette under Dr.
What happens
Lucy Snowe enjoys a prolonged stay at La Terrasse with the Brettons, where she explores Villette under Dr. John's guidance. Madame Beck pays a visit, and later Lucy encounters M. Paul at an art gallery, where he criticizes her interest in a painting of Cleopatra and lectures her on propriety and feminine duty.
Themes in this chapter
Gender and Power
M. Paul's lecture to Lucy about the impropriety of her gazing at the Cleopatra painting highlights the gendered restrictions on women's behavior and the power dynamics between male authority and female autonomy.
Passion and Repression
Lucy's quiet defiance in continuing to look at the Cleopatra despite M. Paul's orders, and her internal reflections on the painting, suggest a tension between natural curiosity and societal repression.
Illusion vs. Reality
The contrast between the idealized, artificial 'Anges' paintings and the raw, sensual Cleopatra underscores the theme of illusion versus reality in representations of womanhood.
Characters to notice
- Lucy Snowe
Narrator and protagonist; enjoys her stay at La Terrasse and visits an art gallery where she observes the Cleopatra painting and interacts with M. Paul.
- John Graham Bretton
Dr. John; hosts Lucy at La Terrasse, shows her around Villette, and later appears at the gallery, where he gazes at the Cleopatra with a fastidious expression.
- Madame Beck
Directress of the pensionnat; visits La Terrasse, appearing charming and complimentary, but reveals a stern demeanor when leaving.
- M. Paul Emanuel
Professor at the school; confronts Lucy in the gallery, criticizes her for looking at the Cleopatra, and lectures her on feminine modesty and duty.
- Ginevra Fanshawe
Mentioned as the object of Dr. John's affections; his humor is noted to falter when he thinks of her.
- Alfred de Hamal
Colonel; observed by Lucy in the gallery, admiring the Cleopatra painting with a dainty and affected manner.
Key passages
“My stay at La Terrasse was prolonged a fortnight beyond the close of the vacation. Mrs. Bretton’s kind management procured me this respite.”
Lucy's visit to La Terrasse was extended by two weeks after the holiday ended, thanks to Mrs. Bretton's thoughtful arrangement.
Highlights Mrs. Bretton's care for Lucy's recovery.
“In that brief fraction of time what a change had been wrought! An instant ago, all sparkles and jests, she now sat sterner than a judge and graver than a sage.”
In a moment, Madame Beck's cheerful demeanor transformed into a stern and serious expression.
Reveals Madame Beck's duplicity and calculated nature.
“He seemed to like nice details almost as much as I liked them myself; he seemed observant of character, and not superficially observant, either.”
Dr. John appreciated specific details and had a keen, deep understanding of people, much like Lucy.
Shows the intellectual connection between Lucy and Dr. John.
“A more despotic little man than M. Paul never filled a professor’s chair.”
M. Paul was an extremely authoritarian teacher, perhaps the most dictatorial ever to hold a professorship.
Emphasizes M. Paul's controlling nature.
“I assured him plainly I could not agree in this doctrine, and did not see the sense of it; whereupon, with his usual absolutism, he merely requested my silence, and also, in the same breath, denounced my mingled rashness and ignorance.”
Lucy openly disagreed with M. Paul's view, but he silenced her and criticized her for being both reckless and ignorant.
Illustrates the conflict between Lucy's independent thinking and M. Paul's authoritarianism.
