Valvèdre

An astonishingly modern novel, George Sand’s Valvèdre questions traditional Romantic representations of women and exposes the disastrous consequences such notions of femininity have for both male and female characters at a time when divorce was illegal. This first English translation by Françoise Massardier-Kenney shows Sand’s control of style and her understanding of the major tensions of early modern France: the role of women in society, the nature of motherhood, the relations between science and art, and the nature of prejudice.