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Together with Sandeau, she the aftemoon. She was a to wear long and vohuni- Chopin) and l'iis compan-
wrote newspaper articles boi'ii storyteller, finisliing nous dresses tl'iat trailed iii ion, Mai'ie d'Agoult.
for Le Figaro and a book one stoiy and iimnediately the filtliy streets, George For much of the niiieteentli
under tl'ie joint nom de begimiing the i'iext. She Sand sometiines chose to centiu'y, France's political
plume of "J. Sand". In eamed much, but also spent wear men's clothes-all in iiistitutions were rocked by
1832, slie broke off her much on travel, her family black, including tlie liat-and successive waves of reprib-
affair with Sandeau and, ... and lovers. Her collect- to smoke cigars. This gave lican and royalist revivals.
affer a year of experiinent- ed works fill 100 vohunes. lier access to places that Despite her aristocratic
ing witli various names, only men could go. The grandinotlier, George Sand
hencefortli wrote ruider the George Sand soon made a puipose was not to become belonged to the group of
pseudonym of "George name for herself as a lead- a man, but to combat the romantic writers who
Sand". ing voice among tlie stereotypes about women remained fumly on the side
Pai'isian intelligentsia. She and to draw attention to the of the people and opposed

After priblishing her first acquired a reputation as a liberties that men enjoyed to the nobility. Sl'ie was
sriccessfiil novel entitled "blue-stocking", which was but women did not. iinmensely poprilar. The
hidiana in 1833, sl'ie was often scoinfully applied to most free-thinking and
mucli souglit after by pub- women withorit acal So wliat was Sand beloved Frencliwoman of
lishers. By 1845, she found bearity wl'io had intellectual doing in Geneva in 1836? her centiiiy died at Nohant
her tiue style iii her so- ambitions. In the suininer She was writing Mauprat, on 8 June 1876 aged 72 and
called nistic novels draw- months, she invited tlie glo- one of her masteipieces. is buried in tl'ie family
iiig their inspiration from rious names of her age for With her in Geneva were cemetery adjacent to the
her cildhood experiences. soir6es at Nohant: Balzac, lier two children, Maurice cliateari.
As a novelist, George Sand Chopin, Delacroix, and Solange, and slie was
was extraordinarily dili- Alexandre Iumas, also sliaring a rather HAYWARD BEYWOOD
gent, usually wi'iting until Flaubert, Liszt, Tourgeniev. Bohemian existence with
the early horirs of the moi'n- In Paris, where at tliat time the composer Franz Liszt
ing and then sleeping until tlie fasl'iion was for women (she had not yet met

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