George Sand, Some Aspects of Her Life and Writings

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GEORGE SAND

Some Aspects of Her Life and Writings

by Rene Doumic

Translated by Alys Hallard




First published in 1910. This volume is dedicated to Madame L. Landouzy
with gratitude and affection


This book is not intended as a study of George Sand. It is merely a
series of chapters touching on various aspects of her life and writings.
My work will not be lost if the perusal of these pages should inspire
one of the historians of our literature with the idea of devoting to the
great novelist, to her genius and her influence, a work of this kind.




CONTENTS

I AURORE DUPIN
II BARONNE DUDEVANT
III A FEMINIST OF 1832
IV THE ROMANTIC ESCAPADE
V THE FRIEND OF MICHEL (DE BOURGES)
VI A CASE OF MATERNAL AFFECTION IN LOVE
VII THE HUMANITARIAN DREAM
VIII 1848
IX THE 'BONNE DAME' OF NOHANT
X THE GENIUS OF THE WRITER



LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

GEORGE SAND (From a photogravure by N. Desmardyl, after a Painting
by A. Charpentier)
GEORGE SAND (From an engraving by L. Calamatia)
JULES SANDEAU (From an etching by M. Desboutins)
ALFRED DE MUSSET (From a lithograph)
FACSIMILE OF AN AUTOGRAPH LETTER OF GEORGE SAND (Written from
Venice to Hipp. Chatiron)
GEORGE SAND (From a lithograph)
F. CHOPIN (From a photograph)
PIERRE LEROUX (From a lithograph by A. Collette)
GEORGE SAND (From a lithograph)



GEORGE SAND




I

AURORE DUPIN

PSYCHOLOGY OF A DAUGHTER OF ROUSSEAU


In the whole of French literary history, there is, perhaps, no subject
of such inexhaustible and modern interest as that of George Sand. Of
what use is literary history? It is not only a kind of museum, in which
a few masterpieces are preserved for the pleasure of beholders. It is
this certainly, but it is still more than this. Fine books are, before
anything else, living works. They not only have lived, but they continue
to live. They live within us, underneath those ideas which form our
conscience and those sentiments which inspire our actions. There is
nothing of greater importance for any society than to make an inventory
of the ideas and the sentiments which are composing its moral atmosphere
every instant that it exists. For every individual this work is the very
condition of his dignity. The question is, should we have these ideas
and these sentiments, if, in the times before us, there had not been
some exceptional individuals who seized them, as it were, in the air and
made them viable and durable? These exceptional individuals were capable
of thinking more vigorously, of feeling more deeply, and of expressing
themselves more forcibly than we are. They bequeathed these ideas
and sentiments to us. Literary history is, then, above and beyond all
things, the perpetual examination of the conscience of humanity.

There is no need for me to repeat what every one knows, the fact that
our epoch is extremely complex, agitated and disturbed. In the midst of
this labyrinth in which we are feeling our way with such difficulty, who
does not look back regretfully to the days when life was more simple,
when it was possible to walk towards a goal, mysterious and unknown
though it might be, by straight paths and royal routes?

George Sand wrote for nearly half a century. For fifty times three
hundred and sixty-five days, she never let a day pass by without
covering more pages than other writers in a month. Her first books
shocked people, her early opinions were greeted with storms. From that
time forth she rushed head-long into everything new, she welcomed
every chimera and passed it on to us with more force and passion in it.
Vibrating with every breath, electrified by every storm, she looked up
at every cloud behind which she fancied she saw a star shining. The work
of another novelist has been called a repertory of human documents. But
what a repertory of ideas her work was! She has said what she had to say
on nearly every subject; on love, the family, social institutions and on
the various forms of government. And with all this she was a woman.
Her case is almost unique in the history of letters. It is intensely
interesting to study the influence of this woman of genius on the
evolution of modern thought.

I shall endeavour to approach my subject conscientiously and with all
due respect. I shall study biography where it is indispensable for the
complete understanding of works. I shall give a sketch of the original
individuals I meet on my path, portraying these only at their point
of contact with the life of our authoress, and it seems to me that
a gallery in which we see Sandeau, Sainte-Beuve, Musset, Michel (of
Bourges), Liszt, Chopin, Lamennais, Pierre Leroux, Dumas _fils_,
Flaubert and many, many others is an incomparable portrait gallery. I
shall not attack persons, but I shall discuss ideas and, when necessary,
dispute them energetically. We shall, I hope, during our voyage, see
many perspectives open out before us.

I have, of course, made use of all the works devoted to George Sand
which were of any value for my study, and among others of the two
volumes published, under the name of Wladimir Karenine,(1) by a woman
belonging to Russian aristocratic society. For the period before
1840, this is the most complete work that has been written. M. Samuel
Rocheblave, a clever University professor and the man who knows more
than any one about the life and works of George Sand, has been my guide
and has helped me greatly with his wise advice. Private collections
of documents have also been placed at my service most generously. I am
therefore able to supply some hitherto unpublished writings. George Sand
published, in all, about a hundred volumes of novels and stories, four
volumes of autobiography, and six of correspondence. In spite of all
this we are still asked for fresh documents.

(1) WLADIMIR KARENINE: _George Sand, Sa vie et ses
oeuvres._ 2 Vols. Ollendorf.

It is interesting, as a preliminary study, to note the natural gifts,
and the first impressions of Aurore Dupin as a child and young girl, and
to see how these predetermined the woman and the writer known to us as
George Sand.

Lucile-Amandine-Aurore Dupin, legitimate daughter of Maurice Dupin and
of Sophie-Victoire Delaborde, was born in Paris, at 15 Rue Meslay, in
the neighbourhood of the Temple, on the 1st of July, 1804. I would call
attention at once to the special phenomenon which explains the problem
of her destiny: I mean by this her heredity, or rather the radical and
violent contrast of her maternal and paternal heredity.

By her father she was an aristocrat and related to the reigning houses.

Her ancestor was the King of Poland, Augustus II, the lover of the
beautiful Countess Aurora von Koenigsmarck. George Sand's grandfather
was Maurice de Saxe. He may have been an adventurer and a _condottiere_,
but France owes to him Fontenoy, that brilliant page of her history.
All this takes us back to the eighteenth century with its brilliant,
gallant, frivolous, artistic and profligate episodes. Maurice de Saxe
adored the theatre, either for itself or for the sake of the women
connected with it. On his campaign, he took with him a theatrical
company which gave a representation the evening before a battle. In this
company was a young artiste named Mlle. de Verrieres whose father was
a certain M. Rinteau. Maurice de Saxe admired the young actress and a
daughter was born of this _liaison_, who was later on recognized by
her father and named Marie-Aurore de Saxe. This was George Sand's
grandmother. At the age of fifteen the young girl married Comte de Horn,
a bastard son of Louis XV. This husband was obliging enough to his wife,
who was only his wife in name, to die as soon as possible. She then
returned to her mother "the Opera lady." An elderly nobleman, Dupin de
Francueil, who had been the lover of the other Mlle. Verrieres, now
fell in love with her and married her. Their son, Maurice Dupin, was
the father of our novelist. The astonishing part of this series
of adventures is that Marie-Aurore should have been the eminently
respectable woman that she was. On her mother's side, though, Aurore
Dupin belonged to the people. She was the daughter of Sophie-Victoire
Delaborde milliner, the grandchild of a certain bird-seller on the
Quai des Oiseaux, who used to keep a public-house, and she was the
great-granddaughter of Mere Cloquart.

This double heredity was personified in the two women who shared George
Sand's childish affection. We must therefore study the portraits of
these two women.

The grandmother was, if not a typical _grande dame_, at least a typical
elegant woman of the latter half of the eighteenth century. She was very
well educated and refined, thanks to living with the two sisters, Mlles.
Verrieres, who were accustomed to the best society. She was a good
musician and sang delightfully. When she married Dupin de Francueil, her
husband was sixty-two, just double her age. But, as she used to say
to her granddaughter, "no one was ever old in those days. It was the
Revolution that brought old age into the world."

Dupin was a very agreeable man. When younger he had been _too_
agreeable, but now he was just sufficiently so to make his wife very
happy. He was very lavish in his expenditure and lived like a prince,
so that he left Marie-Aurore ruined and poor with about three thousand a
year. She was imbued with the ideas of the philosophers and an enemy of
the Queen's _coterie_. She was by no means alarmed at the Revolution and
was very soon taken prisoner. She was arrested on the 26th of November,
1793, and incarcerated in the _Couvent des Anglaises_, Rue des
Fosse's-Saint-Victor, which had been converted into a detention house.
On leaving prison she settled down at Nohant, an estate she had recently
bought. It was there that her granddaughter remembered her in her early
days. She describes her as tall, slender, fair and always very calm. At
Nohant she had only her maids and her books for company. When in Paris,
she delighted in the society of people of her own station and of her
time, people who had the ideas and airs of former days. She continued,
in this new century, the shades of thought and the manners and Customs
of the old _regime._

As a set-off to this woman of race and of culture, Aurore's mother
represented the ordinary type of the woman of the people. She was small,
dark, fiery and violent. She, too, the bird-seller's daughter, had been
imprisoned by the Revolution, and strangely enough in the _Couvent des
Anglaises_ at about the same time as Maurice de Saxe's granddaughter.
It was in this way that the fusion of classes was understood under the
Terror. She was employed as a _figurante_ in a small theatre. This was
merely a commencement for her career. At the time when Maurice Dupin met
her, she was the mistress of an old general. She already had one child
of doubtful parentage. Maurice Dupin, too, had a natural son, named
Hippolyte, so that they could not reproach each other. When Maurice
Dupin married Sophie-Victoire, a month before the birth of Aurore, he
had some difficulty in obtaining his mother's consent. She finally
gave in, as she was of an indulgent nature. It is possible that
Sophie-Victoire's conduct was irreproachable during her husband's
lifetime, but, after his death, she returned to her former ways. She was
nevertheless of religious habits and would not, upon any account, have
missed attending Mass. She was quick-tempered, jealous and noisy and,
when anything annoyed her, extremely hot-headed. At such times she would
shout and storm, so that the only way to silence her was to shout still
more loudly. She never bore any malice, though, and wished no harm
to those she had insulted. She was of course sentimental, but more
passionate than tender, and she quickly forgot those whom she had loved
most fondly. There seemed to be gaps in her memory and also in her
conscience. She was ignorant, knowing nothing either of literature or of
the usages of society. Her _salon_ was the landing of her flat and her
acquaintances were the neighbours who happened to live next door to her.
It is easy to imagine what she thought of the aristocrats who visited
her mother-in-law. She was amusing when she joked and made parodies
on the women she styled "the old Countesses." She had a great deal of
natural wit, a liveliness peculiar to the native of the faubourgs, all
the impudence of the street arab, and a veritable talent of mimicry.
She was a good housewife, active, industrious and most clever in turning
everything to account. With a mere nothing she could improvise a dress
or a hat and give it a certain style. She was always most skilful with
her fingers, a typical Parisian work-girl, a daughter of the street and
a child of the people. In our times she would be styled "a midinette."

Such are the two women who shared the affection of Aurore Dupin. Fate
had brought them together, but had made them so unlike that they were
bound to dislike each other. The childhood of little Aurore served as
the lists for their contentions. Their rivalry was the dominating note
in the sentimental education of the child.

As long as Maurice Dupin lived, Aurore was always with her parents in
their little Parisian dwelling. Maurice Dupin was a brilliant officer,
and very brave and jovial. In 1808, Aurore went to him in Madrid, where
he was Murat's _aide-de-camp_. She lived in the palace of the Prince
of Peace, that vast palace which Murat filled with the splendour of his
costumes and the groans caused by his suffering. Like Victor Hugo,
who went to the same place at about the same time and under similar
conditions, Aurore may have brought back with her:

_de ses courses lointaines_
_Comme un vaguefaisceau de lueurs incertaines._

This does not seem probable, though. The return was painful, as they
came back worried and ill, and were glad to take refuge at Nohant.
They were just beginning to organize their life when Maurice Dupin died
suddenly, from an accident when riding, leaving his mother and his wife
together.

From this time forth, Aurore was more often with her grandmother at
Nohant than with her mother in Paris. Her grandmother undertook the care
of her education. Her half-brother, Hippolyte Chatiron, and she received
lessons from M. Deschartres, who had educated Maurice Dupin. He was
steward and tutor combined, a very authoritative man, arrogant and a
great pedant. He was affectionate, though, and extremely devoted. He
was both detestable and touching at the same time, and had a warm heart
hidden under a rough exterior. Nohant was in the heart of Berry, and
this meant the country and Nature. For Aurore Dupin Nature proved to be
an incomparable educator.

There was only one marked trait in the child's character up to this
date, and that was a great tendency to reverie. For long hours she would
remain alone, motionless, gazing into space. People were anxious about
her when they saw her looking so _stupid_, but her mother invariably
said: "Do not be alarmed. She is always ruminating about something."
Country life, while providing her with fresh air and plenty of exercise,
so that her health was magnificent, gave fresh food and another turn to
her reveries. Ten years earlier Alphonse de Lamartine had been sent
to the country at Milly, and allowed to frequent the little peasant
children of the place. Aurore Dupin's existence was now very much the
same as that of Lamartine. Nohant is situated in the centre of the Black
Valley. The ground is dark and rich; there are narrow, shady paths. It
is not a hilly country, and there are wide, peaceful horizons. At all
hours of the day and at all seasons of the year, Aurore wandered along
the Berry roads with her little playfellows, the farmers' children.
There was Marie who tended the flock, Solange who collected leaves, and
Liset and Plaisir who minded the pigs. She always knew in what meadow or
in what place she would find them. She played with them amongst the hay,
climbed the trees and dabbled in the water. She minded the flock with
them, and in winter, when the herdsmen talked together, assembled round
their fire, she listened to their wonderful stories. These credulous
country children had "seen with their own eyes" Georgeon, the evil
spirit of the Black Valley. They had also seen will-o'-the-wisps,
ghosts, the "white greyhound" and the "Big Beast"! In the evenings, she
sat up listening to the stories told by the hemp-weaver. Her fresh
young soul was thus impregnated at an early age with the poetry of the
country. And it was all the poetry of the country, that which comes from
things, such as the freshness of the air and the perfume of the flowers,
but also that which is to be found in the simplicity of sentiments and
in that candour and surprise face to face with those sights of Nature
which have remained the same and have been just as incomprehensible ever
since the beginning of the world.

The antagonism of the two mothers increased, though. We will not go into
detail with regard to the various episodes, but will only consider the
consequences.

The first consequence was that the intelligence of the child became more
keen through this duality. Placed as she was, in these two different
worlds, between two persons with minds so unlike, and, obliged as she
was to go from one to the other, she learnt to understand and appreciate
them both, contrasts though they were. She had soon reckoned each of
them up, and she saw their weaknesses, their faults, their merits and
their advantages.

A second consequence was to increase her sensitiveness. Each time that
she left her mother, the separation was heartrending. When she was
absent from her, she suffered on account of this absence, and still more
because she fancied that she would be forgotten. She loved her mother,
just as she was, and the idea that any one was hostile or despised her
caused the child much silent suffering. It was as though she had an
ever-open wound.

Another consequence, and by no means the least important one, was to
determine in a certain sense the immense power of sympathy within her.
For a long time she only felt a sort of awe, when with her reserved and
ceremonious grandmother. She felt nearer to her mother, as there was
no need to be on ceremony with her. She took a dislike to all those who
represented authority, rules and the tyranny of custom. She considered
her mother and herself as oppressed individuals. A love for the people
sprang up in the heart of the daughter of Sophie-Victoire. She belonged
to them through her mother, and she was drawn to them now through the
humiliations she underwent. In this little enemy of reverences and of
society people, we see the dawn of that instinct which, later on, was to
cause her to revolt openly. George Sand was quite right in saying,
later on, that it was of no use seeking any intellectual reason as the
explanation of her social preferences. Everything in her was due to
sentiment. Her socialism was entirely the outcome of her suffering and
torments as a child.

Things had to come to a crisis, and the crisis was atrocious. George
Sand gives an account of the tragic scene in her _Histoire de ma vie_.
Her grandmother had already had one attack of paralysis. She was anxious
about Aurore's future, and wished to keep her from the influence of her
mother. She therefore decided to employ violent means to this end. She
sent for the child to her bedside, and, almost beside herself, in a
choking voice, she revealed to her all that she ought to have concealed.
She told her of Sophie-Victoire's past, she uttered the fatal word
and spoke of the child's mother as a lost woman. With Aurore's extreme
sensitiveness, it was horrible to receive such confidences at the age of
thirteen. Thirty years later, George Sand describes the anguish of the
terrible minute. "It was a nightmare," she says. "I felt choked, and it
was as though every word would kill me. The perspiration came out on my
face. I wanted to interrupt her, to get up and rush away. I did not want
to hear the frightful accusation. I could not move, though; I seemed to
be nailed on my knees, and my head seemed to be bowed down by that voice
that I heard above me, a voice which seemed to wither me like a storm
wind."

It seems extraordinary that a woman, who was in reality so kind-hearted
and so wise, should have allowed herself to be carried away like this.
Passion has these sudden and unexpected outbursts, and we see here a
most significant proof of the atmosphere of passion in which the child
had lived, and which gradually insinuated itself within her.

Under these circumstances, Aurore's departure for the convent was a
deliverance. Until just recently, there has always been a convent in
vogue in France in which it has been considered necessary for girls in
good society to be educated. In 1817, _the Couvent des Anglaises_ was in
vogue, the very convent which had served as a prison for the mother
and grandmother of Aurore. The three years she spent there in that "big
feminine family, where every one was as kind as God," she considered the
most peaceful and happy time of her life. The pages she devotes to them
in her _Histoire de ma vie_ have all the freshness of an oasis.
She describes most lovingly this little world, apart, exclusive and
self-sufficing, in which life was so intense.

The house consisted of a number of constructions, and was situated
in the neighbourhood given up to convents. There were courtyards and
gardens enough to make it seem like a small village. There was also
a labyrinth of passages above and underground, just as in one of
Anne Radcliffe's novels. There were old walls overgrown with vine and
jasmine. The cock could be heard at midnight, just as in the heart of
the country, and there was a bell with a silvery tone like a woman's
voice. From her little cell, Aurore looked over the tops of the great
chestnut trees on to Paris, so that the air so necessary for the lungs
of a child accustomed to wanderings in the country was not lacking
in her convent home. The pupils had divided themselves into three
categories: the _diables_, the good girls, who were the specially
pious ones, and the silly ones. Aurore took her place at once among
the _diables_. The great exploit of these convent girls consisted in
descending into the cellars, during recreation, and in sounding the
walls, in order to "deliver the victim." There was supposed to be an
unfortunate victim imprisoned and tortured by the good, kindhearted
Sisters. Alas! all the _diables_ sworn to the task in the _Couvent des
Anglaises_ never succeeded in finding the victim, so that she must be
there still.

Very soon, though, a sudden change-took place in Aurore's soul. It
would have been strange had it been otherwise. With so extraordinarily
sensitive an organization, the new and totally different surroundings
could not fail to make an impression. The cloister, the cemetery, the
long services, the words of the ritual, murmured in the dimly-lighted
chapel, and the piety that seems to hover in the air in houses where
many prayers have been offered up--all this acted on the young girl. One
evening in August, she had gone into the church, which was dimly lighted
by the sanctuary lamp. Through the open window came the perfume of
honeysuckle and the songs of the birds. There was a charm, a mystery
and a solemn calm about everything, such as she had never before
experienced. "I do not know what was taking place within me," she said,
when describing this, later on, "but I breathed an atmosphere that was
indescribably delicious, and I seemed to be breathing it in my very
soul. Suddenly, I felt a shock through all my being, a dizziness came
over me, and I seemed to be enveloped in a white light. I thought I
heard a voice murmuring in my ear: _'Tolle Lege.'_ I turned round, and
saw that I was quite alone. . . ."

Our modern _psychiatres_ would say that she had had an hallucination of
hearing, together with olfactory trouble. I prefer saying that she
had received the visit of grace. Tears of joy bathed her face and she
remained there, sobbing for a long time.

The convent had therefore opened to Aurore another world of sentiment,
that of Christian emotion. Her soul was naturally religious, and the
dryness of a philosophical education had not been sufficient for it. The
convent had now brought her the aliment for which she had instinctively
longed. Later on, when her faith, which had never been very enlightened,
left her, the sentiment remained. This religiosity, of Christian form,
was essential to George Sand.

The convent also rendered her another eminent service. In the _Histoire
de ma vie_, George Sand retraces from memory the portraits of several of
the Sisters. She tells us of Madame Marie-Xavier, and of her despair
at having taken the vows; of Sister Anne-Joseph, who was as kind as an
angel and as silly as a goose; of the gentle Marie-Alicia, whose
serene soul looked out of her blue eyes, a mirror of purity, and of the
mystical Sister Helene, who had left home in spite of her family, in
spite of the supplications and the sobs of her mother and sisters, and
who had passed over the body of a child on her way to God. It is like
this always. The costumes are the same, the hands are clasped in the
same manner, the white bands and the faces look equally pale, but
underneath this apparent uniformity what contrasts! It is the inner life
which marks the differences so vigorously, and shows up the originality
of each one. Aurore gradually discovered the diversity of all these
souls and the beauty of each one. She thought of becoming a nun, but
her confessor did not advise this, and he was certainly wise. Her
grandmother, who had a philosopher's opinion of priests, blamed their
fanaticism, and took her little granddaughter away from the convent.
Perhaps she felt the need of affection for the few months she had still
to live. At any rate, she certainly had this affection. One of the first
results of the larger perspicacity which Aurore had acquired at the
convent was to make her understand her grandmother at last. She was able
now to grasp the complex nature of her relative and to see the delicacy
hidden under an appearance of great reserve. She knew now all that
she owed to her grandmother, but unfortunately it was one of those
discoveries which are made too late.