Sunday, April 23, 2006

George Sand

George Sand is the most famous female writer in the whole world. OR the most famous female writer in France in the 19th century. Whatever. She was born aristocracy in Paris, went to live with her grandmother, went to a convent, married a rich dude and had his babies, and then GOT A DIVORCE and moved back to Paris, to support herself and her children by writing 80 popular novels. After her big spectacular divorce, she started wearing men's clothing and having overt trysts with famous people like Chopin and whatnot. You can see one rendition of that stylish lifestyle in the movie "Impromptu." Starring Hugh Grant as a sort of mild Chopin. And Julian Sands as... Lizcstsztz.

Everyone in 19th century France loved these books, but no one today likes them much. It's pretty hard to find one -- I found my copy of The Haunted Pool in a used bookstore. The publisher is Shameless Hussy Press.

Here's a picture of rural France, just like you might imagine George Sand looking at, when she wrote the book, The Haunted Pool. See the mist? Totally haunting. Someday, I am finally going to write about that book. It wasn't bad. It wasn't great either. It wasn't what I expected.