Steel, Anna de

Born April 22, 1766 in Paris. In the salon of her mother, the literary celebrities of Paris met. Germain from 11 years old was constantly present at these evenings and eagerly listened to the conversations of the guests. In vain, a strict mother tried to restrain and discipline her lively and impressionable daughter, based on the principles of duty. A richly gifted and exalted girl, escaping the influence of her mother, became especially passionate about her father, who spent hours talking about a wide variety of issues with her dearly beloved daughter. Fifteen years old, Germain wrote comments on her father’s famous financial Report and made extracts from Montesquieu 's Spirit of Laws, adding her own thoughts to them. At this time, her favorite writers were Richardson and Russo . Richardson's influence was reflected in her first works, which differed in a sentimental direction (for example, Mirza, Adelaide, Méline).

Rousseau attracted her with his cult of nature and his educational system. Later (1788), she devotes an enthusiastic essay to him on "Letters on the Works and the Personality of J. Zh. Russo." At 17, Germain's heart feels first love, but for the sake of her mother, she has to suppress her feeling. Traces of the internal struggle can be discovered in her comedy: “Sophie, ou les sentiments secrets” (1786), in which the longings of a hopeless feeling are described in bright colors. Madame Necker was looking for a brilliant party for her daughter; her choice rested on the Swedish envoy in Paris, Baron Erich Magnus Steel von Holstein . In the arrangement of this marriage, which was negotiated for 6 years, the French and Swedish courts took part. Yielding to the advice of her father, the 20-year-old Germain decided to give her hand to Baron de Stael, but in this marriage she did not find the happiness she dreamed about. Baron de Stael could not arouse any sympathy in Germain: he was a poorly educated socialite and twice his wife, who attracted him mainly with her rich dowry. When the revolution broke out and Necker was forced to flee France, madame de Stael first remained in Paris. At this time, her salon, replacing the salon of Madame Necker, managed to become the most brilliant in Paris. The memoirs of contemporaries are full of stories about the indelible impression that a young woman made in this period of her life. Her brilliant mind, eloquence and enthusiasm made her the queen of the chosen Parisian society.

When revolutionary unrest began, she, using her influence, saved many from the guillotine, often risking her life herself. The September killings of 1792 forced her to flee Paris. On the road, she was stopped and brought to the town hall, where only the intercession of Manuel saved her from the angry mob. After leaving Paris, she took refuge in England. Among other French emigrants here was also the former Minister of War Count Louis de Narbonne , with whom she began rapprochement back in Paris. This was her first, which found reciprocity, passion, the influence of which was reflected in the book she wrote at that time, “On the Effect of Passion on the Happiness of People and Peoples” (published later, in 1796). Having set a goal, under the influence of the terror experienced by her, to prove the detrimental effect of fanaticism, ambition and other passions on the welfare of individuals and entire societies, the author, as soon as it comes to love (in the chapter “De l'amour”), turns from a strict moralist into enthusiastic praiser. Soon, however, upset by the betrayal of Narbonne, Steel broke up with him. Before leaving England, Steel, indignant at the abusive treatment of Queen Marie Antoinette , anonymously published a pamphlet: Refléxion sur le procès de la Reine, par une femme (1793), in which she tried to arouse compassion for the unfortunate queen.

In 1793, Steel moved to Switzerland (in Copp ) and, having buried her mother here, spent two years in the company of her beloved father, whose mind and character she bowed to the end of her life (in 1804 she published Vie privée de Mr. Necker )

At this time, a variety of artists come to visit and live in her house. The writer Frederic Brun lives with her for several years.

In Copp, Steel met Benjamin Constant . The strong impression that already at the first meeting these diametrically opposite characters made on each other laid the foundation for a romance episode stretching over ten years and having a huge impact on the life and literary activity of Madame de Stael.

In 1796, the French Republic was recognized by Switzerland and Steel could return to Paris. Here, her salon again became an influential literary and political center. Among his regular visitors were Siyes , Talleyrand , Gara , philologist Claude Foriel , economist J. S. Sismondi , B. Constant . Having achieved an unofficial divorce from her husband, but continuing to live with him in the same house, de Stael found herself in a dual position that her secular and political opponents were not slow to take, making her the target of insulting gossip. She gives an outcome to the feelings that worried her at that time in the novel Dolphin, which strengthened her literary fame: this depicts the unfortunate fate of a highly gifted woman who entered into an unequal struggle with the despotism of public opinion. At the same time, Steel is working on an extensive essay, “On Literature Considered in Connection with Social Establishments” (1796–99). The task of the book is to trace the influence of religion, morals, legislation on literature and vice versa. Studying the interaction of society and literature, observing gradual changes in ideas and forms of everyday life, Steel notes in the course of historical development a slow but continuous improvement (perfectibilité). In the mass of well-aimed remarks, she reveals a subtle understanding of the connection of various forms and directions of literary works with the social environment and ends the book with a teaching on what literature should be in the new republican society: it should serve as an expression of new social ideals and be the defender of political and moral freedom. The book "On Literature", published after the coup d'etat of the 18th Brumaire , was contrary to the onset of reaction. The idea of ​​the interaction of literature and the social system and the inevitability of the decline of literature with the disappearance of political freedom could not but seem dangerous to the government of the first consul.

When Madame de Stael's salon became the center of the opposition, she was ordered to leave Paris. In 1802, she went to Germany with Constant. Here she meets Goethe , Schiller , Fichte , W. Humboldt , A. Schlegel ; she entrusts the education of her children to the latter. The impressions that she took out of her trip to Germany formed the basis of the book: “On Germany”, written five years later (see below). In 1804, her father's fatal illness calls her to Koppe. Beginning from this time, the cooling of B. Constant to her, to which she has for many years been deeply attached, makes her suffer so much that she is dreaming of near death. To drown out her mental anguish, she goes to Italy. In Milan, the Italian poet Vincenzo Monti makes a strong impression on her. Although her heart for Constant has not yet died out in her heart, she is gradually carried away by a new feeling, and in her letters to Monty her friendly tone is soon replaced by enthusiastic confessions. She calls him to Koppe and lives a whole year waiting for his arrival; but the weak-minded poet, fearing to incur the wrath of Napoleon and lose his pension, all postpones his arrival until Steel stops correspondence with him. The fruit of de Stael's journey through Italy was her novel Corinne ou l'Italie. Italy attracted the attention of Steel not by its nature, but as an arena of a great historical past. She believes that the spirit of the great people still lurks here, and she desires much for the revival of this spirit. Steel devotes much space to thinking about the historical fate of Italy and Rome, about Italian literature, art, tombstones, etc. The plot of the novel is the question of the fate of a woman of genius, the contradiction between love and glory. Corinna is Steel itself, idealized and exalted to perfection; she exerts all mental strength, expends all her talents to reach the climax of glory - and all this only in order to be loved; but it remains unappreciated by those whom it puts above all. In the personality of Lord Nelville, there are hints of Constan and his betrayal. “Corinna” - a work more seasoned than “Dolphin” - was a brilliant success among contemporaries. In 1807, taking advantage of the absence of Napoleon, Steel, yearning for Paris, decided to settle in its vicinity. The rumor that she appears incognito in Paris itself reached the emperor, who, in the midst of the cares of the Prussian campaign, found time to prescribe her immediate removal to Coppe.

In 1807-1808 Steel again visited Weimar and traveled to Munich and Vienna. Returning from Germany, she in Geneva learned from Constantine about his secret marriage with Charlotte Gardenberg. This message at first enraged her, but then religious peace came upon her soul. To this era of her life belong her works on the book “On Germany”, the most finished of her works, in which Steel sets out to acquaint French society with the character of German nationality, with the life of the Germans, their literature, philosophy and religion. The author introduces the French reader into an alien world of ideas, images and feelings, and tries to explain the features of this world whenever possible, pointing to historical and local conditions and constantly drawing a parallel between the aspirations and concepts of the French and German nations. For the first time, in an era of dominance of cosmopolitan ideas, Steel highlights the issue of nationality rights. It sets as its task the protection of nations, their rights to political and spiritual independence; she is trying to prove that a nation is not the creation of the arbitrariness of individuals, but a historical phenomenon, and that the world of Europe is determined by mutual respect for the rights of peoples. When the book "On Germany" was published (1810), Madame de Stael sent it to Napoleon, with a letter in which she asked him for an audience. She believed that the power of her conviction, conquering many, could affect the emperor. Napoleon remained adamant. Having ordered her book to be burned, albeit censored, he ordered her to stay in Koppe, where he surrounded her with spies and forbade her to go to friends.

Conscious of herself abandoned, she wrote: "the proximity of evening twilight is felt, among which there is no longer a trace of the radiance of the morning dawn." But she was destined to once again discover happiness. In 1810, a young officer, Albert de Rocca, returned from a Spanish campaign to heal from wounds. While caring for him, Steel charmed him and he, with his passion for passion, despite the significant difference in age, also infected Steel. After some hesitation, she secretly married him. In 1812, the persecution of the Swiss authorities, acting in favor of Napoleon, forced Steel to flee Coppe, and she went through Austria to Russia.

She arrived in Russia on July 14, 1812, on the anniversary of the French Revolution ^[5] , and already after the outbreak of the Patriotic War of 1812 . Here she was given the widest hospitality. On August 5, she was introduced to Their Majesties. V. L. Borovikovsky paints her portrait. K. N. Batyushkov characterizes de Stael: "... Durn as a devil and smart as an angel."

September 7, the day of the battle of Borodino , she left Petersburg, and soon arrived in Stockholm ^[6] . Bernadotte offered her refuge in Sweden, but in June 1813 she went to England and remained there until Napoleon was defeated and imprisoned on the island of Elbe; then she returned to Paris after a 10-year exile.

She described her impressions in Russia in the second part of her book “Dix années d'Exil” (1821). Here, many well-aimed remarks about the character of the Russian people, about the social structure of that time, about the life and customs of different classes of society are scattered ^[7] . A. S. Pushkin highly appreciated the work of de Stael ^[8] .

The reaction that took place after the restoration aroused her indignation. She was equally outraged by the “humiliation” of France by foreigners, and the intolerance and obscurantism of the party of aristocratic emigrants. In this mood, she set about ending her Considérations sur les principaux événements de la révolution française (1818). This composition consists of several parts, between which there is no complete unity. Initially, Madame de Stael intended to confine herself to expounding the first phase of the revolution and write, among other things, an apology for her father; but then she expanded the content of her work, setting out to present the defense of the French Revolution and find out its main results. To this she added a sketch about the English constitution and society, and then discussions about the state of affairs in France in 1816. For 25 years (1789-1814) de Stael not only observed all stages of the development of the French revolutionary spirit, but responded with all its impression in kind to all the excitement of this turbulent era. Summing up the revolutionary period, Madame de Stael sees the main goal of the revolution in the people's conquest of political and spiritual freedom. The revolution not only made France free, but also gave it prosperity. If the crimes of individuals have stained the revolution, then so many exalted aspects of the human spirit have never been manifested in France. Having inspired noble enthusiasm into many hearts, the revolution put forward great figures and bequeathed to the future the eternal principles of freedom. The reasons for the revolution lie in the general historical conditions, and not in the actions and aspirations of individuals. In the chapter on restoration, de Stael gives a vivid picture of the current reactionary regime: “Is it possible,” she writes, “now it is possible to rule as it was three hundred years ago?! ... They (the new rulers) need arbitrary rule, religious intolerance , a court aristocracy that does not have no merit except the family tree, the people are ignorant and disenfranchised, the army reduced to a simple mechanism, the constraint of the press, the absence of any civil freedom - and in return its police spies and bought journalism, which would praise this so the darkness! "The final pages of the book are like the political testament of Madame de Stael. The political reorganization of Europe will be carried out by peoples and in the name of nationalities. She foresees the great future of the Russian people and the primacy of the North American United States. She advises the Germans and Italians to rally in the federation.

On February 21, 1817, Germaine de Stael went to a reception hosted by the Minister of Louis XVIII. She fell as she climbed the stairs. There was a hemorrhage in the brain. For several months, de Stael was ill and died in 1817 on the significant day of the beginning of the French Revolution - July 14. ^[9]

The moral character of Madame de Stael is dominated, according to Professor Storozhenko, two main features: the passionate need for love, personal happiness - and no less passionate love for freedom. It is necessary to note another third feature, which, together with the above, recreates not only its moral, but also its mental appearance. “Germaine Necker,” wrote the historian A. Sorel , “also longed for thoughts, as well as happiness. Her mind was distinguished by the insatiable greed to know everything, the ability to hug everything ... he had the gift of penetrating other people's ideas and the gift of instant inspiration with his own ideas; both of them were not the result of lengthy reflection, but were born during the conversation, in the form of inspired improvisation. ” Equally impetuous and impetuous, both in her hobbies and in her literary work, passionately clutching for new ideas that were floating in the air, Madame de Stael often changed her views on certain issues [For example, she used to be fond of materialism, and in the end life becomes a spiritualist, then rejects free will, then allows it, etc.], but invariably remained true to the principles of civil freedom and the political ideals of the Constituent Assembly of 1789. De Stael’s influence on subsequent French literature - splint and multilateral. A. Sorel calls her “muse” of a large circle of French scientists and writers. F. Guizot , according to Sorel, was the interpreter of political ideas Madame de Stael. Its influence also affected the work of many other French writers (Kine, Charles Nodier , Pierre Lanfre). Her book, “On Germany,” according to Goethe, is a gigantic ram that has breached the Chinese wall of prejudice between the two nations. In the field of French literature, she, together with Chateaubriand , is rightly considered the founder of the French romantic school. Madame de Stael did not have great fiction; creating characters she failed. In the face of her heroines, she describes only herself, the feelings she experienced; in her other faces there is little life; they have almost no effect, but only express the views that the writer puts into their mouths. But she was the first not only to give an exact definition of the nature of the new (romantic) literature, in contrast to the classical one, but she also pointed out to creativity new methods of reproducing reality, new poetic forms.

Lifetime Translations into Russian

• "Melina", per. Karamzin, 1795
• "Corinna", M., 1809
• "Dolphin", M., 1803
• "New Tales", M., 1815

Modern editions

• Corinna or Italy. M., 1969.
• “On the influence of passions on the happiness of people and nations” // Literary Manifests of Western European Romantics, ed. A.S. Dmitrieva, M., Publishing House of Moscow University, 1980, S.363-374, trans. E.P. Grechanoi;
• “On Literature in its Connection with Social Establishments” // Literary Manifests of Western European Romantics, ed. A.S. Dmitrieva, M., Publishing House of Moscow University, 1980, S.374-383, trans. E.P. Grechanoi;
• “On Germany” // Literary manifestos of West European romantics, ed. A.S. Dmitrieva, M., Moscow University Press, 1980, S.383-391, trans. E.P. Grechanoi;
• “On literature reviewed in connection with public institutions”, M., Art, 1989, series: The History of Aesthetics in Monuments and Documents, trans. V. A. Milchina ;
• “Ten years in exile”, M., OGI, 2003, foreword, trans. and comment. V.A. Milchina.
• Reasoning on the main events of the French Revolution / Fragment from the book // New Youth , 2017, No. 3.

Other works Steel

• “Réflexions sur la paix adressées à M. Pitt et aux Français” (1795)
• Réflexions sur le suicide (1813)
• Zulma et trois nouvelles (1813)
• Essais dramatiques (1821)
• Oeuvres complètes 17 t., (1820-21)

Works about her

• Madame de Stael's biography was compiled by Ms. Necker de Saussure (in Oeuvr. Compl.) And Blennerhaset: Frau von S., ihre Freunde und ihre Bedeutung in Politik und Litteratur (1889).

• Gérando, Lettres inédites de m-me de Récamier and de m-me de Staël (1868);
• Correspondance diplomatique, 1783–99, Baron Steel-G. (1881); * * * * Norris, "Life and times of M. de S." (1853);
• Amiel, Etudes sur M. de S. (1878)
• A. Stevens, “M-me de Staël” (1881)
• A. Sorel, “M-me de Staël” (1890; there is a Russian translation)

works of Saint Bev and Brandes

• Storozhenko, “Madame de Stael” (Herald of Europe, 1879, No. 7)
• Shakhov, “Essays on the literary movement in the first half of the 19th century. Lectures on the history of French literature ”(1894)
• Trachevsky A.S. Ms. Steel in Russia // Historical Bulletin, 1894. - T. 58. - No. 10. - P. 160-188.
• S. V — Stein, “Madame de Stael” (“Herald of Europe”, 1900, No. 8-10)
• Lyubarets S.N. Aesthetics of Germaine de Stael in the context of the Enlightenment // ANOTHER XVIII CENTURY. Collection of scientific papers. Repl. ed. N.T. Pakhsaryan. M., 2002
• Plessix Gray Francine du . Madame de Staël. - New York: Atlas & Co , 2008 .-- ISBN 978-1-934633-17-5 .
• Sorel Albert, Weinstein Sophia Madame de Steel. - Book Club of Bookies, 2018 .-- 496 p. - ISBN 978-5-4224-1364-5

• Steel, Anna-Louise-Germain // Brockhaus and Efron Encyclopedic Dictionary : in 86 volumes (82 volumes and 4 additional). - SPb. , 1890-1907.
• Tomashevsky B.V., Volpert L.I., de Stael in the Pushkin Encyclopedia
• L. I. Volpert, “... Senseless and merciless” (PUSHKIN and Germain de STAL ON FANATISM)
• L. I. Volpert, “MORE ABOUT THE“ NICE JOKE “LADIES DE STEEL”
• De Stael in the encyclopedia "Around the World"
• Société des études staëliennes
• E. N. Kornilova, Russoism as the philosophical foundation of romantic mythologies And J. de Stael // ANOTHER XVIII CENTURY. Collection of scientific papers. Repl. ed. N.T. Pakhsaryan. M., 2002 (unavailable link from 05/19/2013 [2279 days] - history )