- Fanny de Beauharnais
Fanny de Beauharnais, née Marie-Anne-Françoise Mouchard, (
4 October 1737 ,Paris -2 July 1813 ) was a French lady of letters. She was the mother of French politician Claude de Beauharnais.Life
The daughter of the receiver-general of finances in Champagne, whilst very young she married comte Claude de Beauharnais, uncle of
Alexandre de Beauharnais and ofFrançois de Beauharnais . She was godmother to Alexandre's daughterHortense de Beauharnais .She wrote poetry from her childhood onwards and, after separating from her husband, devoted herself to literature, become friends with literary figures such as
Claude Joseph Dorat andMichel de Cubières-Palmézeaux . Her salon became a choice social venue, and she became a member of the Académie des Arcades. In 1787 she wrote and put on a five act prose comedy entitled "la Fausse inconstance", though it was not a success. In 1790 she was received into the Académie de Lyon.Her detractors attributed her work to Dorat and other friends of hers. The marquise de Créquy, in his "Souvenirs", adjudged that Lebrun had very rudely and unjustly applied to her an old
epigram of Pavillon aboutCharlotte-Rose de Caumont La Force :Works
*"Mélanges de poésies fugitives et de prose sans conséquence" (Paris, 1772, 2 vol. in-8°)
*"Lettres de Stéphanie", historical novel (Paris, 1773, in-8°)
*"l’Abailard supposé", novel (Paris, 1780, in-8°)
*"l’Île de la Félicité", philosophical poem (1801, in-8°)
*"le Voyage de Zizi et d’Azor", poem in 5 books (1811, in-8°).ource
*Gustave Vapereau, "Dictionnaire universel des littératures", Paris, Hachette, 1876, p. 217.
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