AMÉLIE NOTHOMB’S BLUEBEARD: HYPERTEXTUAL PACT AND REVERSAL OF FAIRY-TALE FIGURES
AMÉLIE NOTHOMB’S BLUEBEARD: HYPERTEXTUAL PACT AND REVERSAL OF FAIRY-TALE FIGURES

Summary/Abstract: This article examines Amélie Nothomb’s Barbe bleue (2012) as a contemporary rewriting of Charles Perrault’s tale, focusing on the hypertextual pact established by the title and on the structural reversal of fairy-tale figures. Drawing on theories of hypertextuality and literary rewriting, the study argues that Nothomb’s novel does not merely modernize its hypotext but reconfigures its symbolic system. The explicit paratextual reference to Perrault initiates a relational mode of reading in which meaning emerges from the tension between recognition and displacement. Particular attention is paid to the chromatic structure of the novel. While Perrault’s Bluebeard is marked by the semantically charged color blue, Nothomb replaces this sign with a dominant yellow-gold aesthetic, transforming color into a structural principle that organizes desire, perception, and death. Through the figure of don Elemirio, color becomes a taxonomic and metaphysical system culminating in the “asymptotic yellow” attributed to Saturnine. The black chamber functions as a mortuary chromatic encyclopedia, where women are reduced to fixed images, completing a spectral totality. At the same time, the novel subverts gender archetypes inherited from the fairy tale. Saturnine, whose name activates both planetary and alchemical symbolism, embodies lucidity, resistance, and ontological density, rather than culpable curiosity. The reduction of secondary characters and the dialogic structure of the narrative intensify the duel between fixation and critical intelligence. Ultimately, Nothomb’s rewriting operates not through rupture but through symbolic complementarity. The marvelous is displaced from the supernatural to the aesthetic realm of color and image, revealing the latent tensions of the original tale while reshaping its center of gravity.

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