INTRODUCTION

The talented authoress, known to thousands of readers as George Sand, was born in Paris în 1804. Her father was Maurice Dupin, an aristocrat, and one of Napoleon's dashing soldiers. He was disowned by his family when he married the pretty, but somewhat shallow and commonplace, daughter of an old bonhomme who sold birds on the quais of Paris. The arrivai of the child, Armandine-Lucile-Aurore, restored Maurice to hîs mother's favor. After his eariy death the mother and grandmother quarreled at times over Aurore's bringing up. Her éducation was partly in a Paris couvent, but largely a random afïair, consisting of the child's own reading, some attention from a private tutor, and much contact with nature and the simple folk of the countryside arouijd the grandmother's estate of Nohant in Berry. At a tender âge she was married in the conventional way to a country squire, Baron Dudevant, who soon made her wretched by his bibulous habits and leanings toward ancillary loves. In a few years the young baroness left her husband, and came to Paris to make her own way. Later the law granted her formai séparation and the custody of her children.

At first she tried china painting, but soon gave this