George Sand

Elizabeth Harlan

Published by Yale University Press 2008

George Sand

Elizabeth Harlan

https://doi.org/10.12987/9780300130560

Overview
Contents

About this book

George Sand was the most famous—and most scandalous—woman in nineteenth-century France. As a writer, she was enormously prolific—she wrote more than ninety novels, thirty-five plays, and thousands of pages of autobiography. She inspired writers as diverse as Flaubert and Proust but is often remembered for her love affairs with such figures as Musset and Chopin. Her affair with Chopin is the most notorious: their nine-year relationship ended in 1847 when Sand began to suspect that the composer had fallen in love with her daughter, Solange.

Drawing on archival sources—much of it neglected by Sand’s previous biographers—Elizabeth Harlan examines the intertwined issues of maternity and identity that haunt Sand’s writing and defined her life. Why was Sand’s relationship with her daughter so fraught? Why was a woman so famous for her personal and literary audacity ultimately so conflicted about women’s liberation? In an effort to solve the riddle of Sand’s identity, Harlan examines a latticework of lives that include Solange, Sand’s mother and grandmother, and Sand’s own protagonists, whose stories amplify her own.

Author / Editor information

Elizabeth Harlan is the author of two novels, Footfalls and Watershed. She lives in Paris.

Topics

General Interest

Frontmatter Publicly Available Download PDF	i
Contents Publicly Available Download PDF	vii
Introduction Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	xi
Part One: Foundations and Fault Lines
1. Her Father’s Daughter Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	3
2. The Importance of Being Marie-Aurore de Saxe Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	10
3. Sophie Victorious Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	26
4. Spanish Sojourn Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	37
5. Sophie’s Choice Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	53
Part Two: Revelations and Confessions
6. Enigma of the Sphinx Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	65
7. Convent and Conversion Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	72
8. Coming of Age Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	82
9. Pater Semper Incertus Est Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	91
Part Three: Marriage, Motherhood, and Misgivings
10. Marriage and Motherhood Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	101
11. Passion in the Pyrenees Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	111
12. Ready, Set, Go Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	118
13. “Our Motto Is Freedom” Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	126
14. George Sand Is Born Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	141
Part Four: The Daughter’s Demise
15. A Daughter Is Born Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	151
16. The Author and the Actress Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	160
17. Sons and Lovers Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	172
18. Mother Love Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	191
19. Liaison Dangereuse Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	202
20. Broken Bonds: Solange and Chopin Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	215
21. Collateral Damage and Lucrézia Floriani Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	228
Part Five: War and Peace
22. Revolution and Reverberations Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	239
23. Coming to Writing Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	258
24. Confession of a Young Girl Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	273
25. The Art of Loving Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	285
Epilogue Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	311
Notes Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	317
Select Bibliography Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	353
Acknowledgments Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	361
Index Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	363

Language: English
Publisher: Yale University Press
Pages
- Main content: 400

eBook

Published: October 1, 2008
ISBN: 9780300130560