VI INTRODUCTION

up for lîterary work. She lîved a free, bohemîan lîfe, often dressing as a man. Out of her intimacy wîth Jules' Sandeau came her first novel, ''Rose et Blanche/' written in collaboration wîth him. From a suggestion of his she made up her pen name, George Sand. Her first independently written novel, "Indiana," appeared in 1831. Its great and instant popularity showed where her future fay, and for the rest of her long life — she died in 1876 — she reeled off novel after novel. After her first successes and excesses in Paris, her life becanie more simple and regular. Much of her time she spent at her childhood home, Nohant, resting from labor by botanizing. Men came înto her life, had their influence on her and passed on, leaving her untroubled, and with added expérience to be turned to literary account. Most notable was her affair with the poet Musset. Their well-knowh escapade and trip to Italy wrecked the.latter's life, so he claimed, but had little effect on the lady. Intellectually she was like a sponge, taking up ail sorts of impressions from her associâtes. She was seldom original, but had a gift of expressing in happy fashion whatever she picked up from others. Toward the latter part of her carreer she tried her hand at the drama, staging some of her novels, but her famé does not rest upbn thèse efforts.

While it is not likely that George Sand ever had any conscious plan or system, critics usually divide her work into four parts. Chronologîcally they are