Woman Triumphant: The story of her struggles for freedom, education and political rights.: Dedicated to all noble-minded women by an appreciative member of the other sex.Cronau, Rudolf
History
Woman Triumphant: The story of her struggles for freedom, education and political rights.: Dedicated to all noble-minded women by an appreciative member of the other sex.
Cronau, Rudolf
Women -- History
In the literature of the 19th Century =Anne Louise Germaine Necker,
Baroness de Stael-Holstein=, held a singular position. Many of her
contemporaries exalted her as “the founder of the romantic movement” who
gave “ideas” to the world. To-day she is almost forgotten, and her
novels and plays, among them “Corinne” and “Sophie and Jane Grey” lie
undisturbed and dusty on the library shelves.
Perhaps her most remarkable contribution to literature was her book
“L’Allemagne,” which was announced in 1810. It gave a most intelligent
exposition of the science, literature, arts, philosophy, and other
characteristics of the Germans, gathered from the author’s own
observations. The work, written with a spirited independence, quite at
variance with the deadening political influence of Napoleon, irritated
the emperor to such a degree that he ordered the minister of police to
seize and destroy the whole edition of 10,000 copies. Besides this he
exiled the author from France. When, after the overthrow of Napoleon,
she returned to Paris, she had her book printed again, and had the
satisfaction of seeing it eagerly read by millions of Frenchmen.
Of all French authoresses of the 19th Century =Armantine Lucile Aurore
Dudevant=, or “=George Sand=,” holds the supreme rank. In the long line
of her thoughtful, concentrated and meditative novels “Valentine,”
“Indiana,” “Lelia,” “Mauprat,” and “Le Meunier d’ Angibault” are real
gems of fiction, whose influence can be traced in many later works by
writers of France and other nations.
Of her contemporaries =Louise Révoil Colet=, =Eugenie de Guérin=,
=Pauline de la Ferronay Craven=, and, above all, =Delphine de Girardin=
must be mentioned, whose “Letters Parisiennes” as well as her poems,
novels, dramas and comedies belong to the most excellent productions of
the 19th Century. By her dramatic pieces “L’Ecole des Journalistes,”
“Judith,” “Cleopatra,” “C’est la faute du mari,” “Lady Tartufe,” and
others she reaped a wide popularity. In the literary society of her time
she exercised no small personal influence. Balzac, Alfred de Musset,
Gautier, and Victor Hugo were among the frequenters of her salon.
* * * * *
Among the British woman writers of the latter part of the 18th Century
=Jane Austen= was the most distinguished. Her novels “Sense and
Sensibility,” “Pride and Prejudice,” “Emma,” “Northanger Abbey” and
“Persuasion” have been likened to the carefully-executed paintings of
the Dutch masters for their charming pictures of quiet, natural life.
=Ann Ward Radcliffe= wrote three novels unsurpassed of their kind in
English literature: “The Romance of the Forest,” “The Mysteries of
Udolpho,” and “The Italian.” They are distinguished for originality,
ingenuity of plot, fertility of incident, and skill in devising
apparently supernatural occurrences capable of explanation by human
agency and natural coincidence.
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