Amantine Lucile Aurore Dupin (1804 - 1876), best known by her nom de plume George Sand, was a French novelist and memoirist. She is equally well known for her much publicized romantic affairs with a number of artists, including the composer and pianist Frederic Chopin and the writer Alfred de Musset. A liaison with the writer Jules Sandeau heralded her literary debut. They published a few stories in collaboration, signing them "Jules Sand." Her first published novel, Rose et Blanche (1831), was written in collaboration with Sandeau. She subsequently adopted, for her first independent novel, Indiana (1832), the pen name that made her famous - George Sand. Drawing from her childhood experiences of the countryside, she wrote the pastoral novels La Mare au Diable (1846), Francois le Champi (1847-1848), La Petite Fadette (1849) and Les Beaux Messieurs Bois-Dore (1857). A Winter in Majorca described the period that she and Chopin spent on that island from 1838 to 1839. Her other novels include Indiana (1832), Lelia (1833), Mauprat (1837), Le Compagnon du Tour de France (1840), Consuelo (1842-1843) and Le Meunier d'Angibault (1845). Theater pieces and autobiographical pieces include Histoire de ma vie (1855), Elle et Lui (1859, about her affair with Musset), Journal Intime (posthumously published in 1926) and Correspondence. Sand often performed her theatrical works in her small private theater at the Nohant estate. In addition, Sand authored literary criticism and political texts. Because of her early life, she sided with the poor and working class as well as women's rights. When the 1848 Revolution began, she was an ardent republican. Sand started her own newspaper, which was published in a workers' co-operative.
