Women’s Writing in the British Isles from the Beginnings to the Present
Stéphanie-Félicité de Genlis
-
Standard Name: Genlis, Stéphanie-Félicité de
Birth Name: Caroline Stéphanie Félicité Ducrest
Married Name: Caroline Stéphanie Félicité de Genlis
Titled: Caroline Stéphanie Félicité, comtesse de Genlis
Used Form: Stephanie-Felicite de Genlis
Used Form: Stéphanie-Félicité de Genlis, Countess of Genlis and Marchioness
of Sillery
SFG
, French aristocrat, royal mistress, and later a political refugee in England, made her mark as an educational theorist and writer for children (plays, stories, and good advice) during the decade leading up to the French Revolution. She also published adult novels, romances, and an autobiography. In England at least it was her writing for children that was admired and influential.
"Stéphanie-Félicité de Genlis" Retrieved from https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/6/6e/Madame_de_Genlis_1780.jpg/847px-Madame_de_Genlis_1780.jpg.
The title-page quotes from Spenser
, and the first chapter from Johnson
's Rambler. This sophisticated novel, with a North Yorkshire setting, a large cast of upper-class characters, and a wide range of reference...
MMS
began making up stories in her sixth year, but wrote later, what they were I have not the least idea. I was too young to write them down; but when I had thought of...
Intertextuality and Influence
Maria Edgeworth
The appearance of a rival translation (by some Ladies, unidentified, who had turned their polite accomplishments into earning skills as a result of falling into comparative poverty from ease and opulence) pre-empted publication...
Intertextuality and Influence
Mary Martha Sherwood
She began it in connection with the writing game shared with her sister: the exchange of letters in the voice of French characters, modelled on those of Stéphanie-Félicité de Genlis
in Adelaide and Theodore; or...
Friends, Associates
Helen Maria Williams
In Paris HMW
frequented Mme Roland
's salon, and she and Stone
became close friends of Roland and her husband
. Those who visited HMW
early in her time in Paris included Mary Wollstonecraft
(who...
Friends, Associates
Lady Eleanor Butler
Stéphanie-Félicité de Genlis
was at Plas Newydd in 1792 with her daughter (or reputed daughter) Pamela; and six years later, in May 1798, Pamela (now Lady Edward Fitzgerald
) was there again, putting a strain...
Lady Campbell was the daughter of romantically-associated parents: Lord Edward Fitzgerald
...
Friends, Associates
Maria Edgeworth
While she was in Paris ME
met the now elderly and impoverished Mme de Genlis
, whose Adèle et Théodore she had translated in her early teens.
Butler, Marilyn. Maria Edgeworth: A Literary Biography. Clarendon, 1972.
197
Fictionalization
Lady Eleanor Butler
Among many less formal honours during the ladies' lifetimes, the most extraordinary was LEB
's award of a French, ancien régime, military medal: the Croix St Louis. It is shown in a famous portrait of...
Family and Intimate relationships
Ada Leverson
AL
's daughter, Violet
, married Major Guy Wyndham in June 1923; they had two children.
Speedie, Julie. Wonderful Sphinx: The Biography of Ada Leverson. Virago, 1993.
Her husband no longer had any duty to support her. At this time he was in Paris, making a living as an English teacher among the offspring of the French nobility, under the patronage...
Family and Intimate relationships
Lady Cynthia Asquith
LCA
's mother, Mary
, Lady Wemyss, was born a Wyndham, a descendent of the writer Félicité, Mme de Genlis
, and of her royal lover Philippe Egalité
, Duc d'Orléans (who was also father...
Education
Fredrika Bremer
As FB grew older, she became increasingly interested in novels. At the age of fifteen she was beyond measure happy
Bremer, Fredrika. Life, Letters, and Posthumous Works of Fredrika Bremer. Editor Bremer, Charlotte, Sampson Low, Son and Marston, 1868, https://archive.org/details/lifelettersposth00bremuoft/mode/2up.
34
to be allowed the privilege of reading fiction for a half hour every night...
