"La Carte de Tendre en 1869",

This satirical map of "tenderness" was created by Paul Hadol, a French illustrator and caricaturist, and was based on Madeleine de Scudery's map of the same name published in her historical novel, Clélie, in 1653. Hadol updated the map to reflect French society at the end of the Second Empire, creating a heart-shaped land bisected by rivers into four quadrants. The map is accompanied by an explanatory article on verso, written by Eugene Vermersch, a poet and social commentator. The map and commentary portray a gloomy and critical view of love and matters of the heart, shrouded in misogyny. Words and phrases related to relationships fill the heart, with each one illustrated by a small vignette. While the words on the map elicit positive connotations, the imagery depicts the opposite (and is typically perpetrated by a woman). "Tenderness" is illustrated by a woman throwing a meal at her partner; "Fidelity" is a woman walking arm in arm with a row of foreign men; "Integrity" is a woman cheating at a card game; and "Gratitude" is a woman literally kicking a man out of her home after he has given her a bag of money. Of course men aren't completely innocent, engaging in an elaborate and over-indulgent feast with a woman rather than the "Little Cares," and visiting a brothel disguised as a "Bar of Tenderness." However the map is clearly drawn from a man's point of view, with men attempting to reach the "Island of the Good Woman" while encountering every obstacle in the "Dangerous Sea," including the Bailiff's Reef, the Bank of Misery, the Reefs of Suicide, and the Islet of Softening (becoming dimwitted). Clearly finding a good woman was unattainable, considering that the "Island of the Good Woman" was considered Terres Inconnues or "Land Unknown."

While the goals of the map and accompanying commentary were to criticize the lack of tenderness and the obsession with wealth among the French, it is clear that women are largely at fault. Vermersch writes of women worshiping money ("a new sun shines, the gentle, the beautiful, the sacred 100 Sous Piece, nailed steadfastly into the sky as a fixed star . . . and . . . now all women worship the sun") and calls women "Grue," a colloquial term for a prostitute.

The map appears on the front cover of a 4-page issue of L'Eclipse. The fourth page of the issue includes numerous caricatures entitled "Extravagances, par A. Humbert."

References: PJ Mode Collection #1072.

Condition: A

The map and text are clean and bright with minor marginal soiling. The fold has been professionally reinforced with old paper, repairing a few small holes along the fold.