Description
Book SynopsisThe first book-length history of the classic French children's author, the comtesse de Ségur (1799-1874). Virtually unknown in the English-speaking world, in France Ségur is a national icon and a cultural phenomenon. This study of her life and works will interest scholars of children's literature, gender studies, and nineteenth-century France. -- .
Trade ReviewA masterful essay...it will be impossible to claim knowledge of the comtesse de Ségur if you have not read Sophie Heywood’s book
Rémi Saudray, review in Cahiers Séguriens, 10 (2012) pp. 161-167.
Heywood has made Ségur a figure of considerable interest to historians, not just biographers or literary scholars.
Sarah A. Curtis, French History, 2012
Winner of the 2012 University of Reading Research Endowment Trust Fund Best Research Output Prize
The strength of this informative and insightful book is its ability to contextualize the life story and the writings of the comtesse de Ségur without losing sight of the complexities that both present. Neither Ségur’s life nor her writings were always consistent, yet in showing how they intersected with new ideas about childhood, a militant Catholic revival, new publishing strategies, and shifting notions of gender, Heywood hasmade Ségur a figure of considerable interest to historians, not just biographers or literary scholars.
Sarah A. Curtis, French History, vol 26, no 4, December 2012
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Table of ContentsList of abbreviations
List of illustrations
Introduction
1. Life stories
2. Nobles, saints, and delinquents: constructions of childhood in the collected works of Madame de Ségur
3. The tribulations of an author: writing, censorship and the reading public under the Second Empire
4. The comtesse and the culture wars
5. Model girls and divine women: reading the comtesse de Ségur
Conclusion
Appendix I: The collected works of the comtesse de Ségur
Appendix II: Editions
Select bibliography
Index
