This is the novelist of the objective school, the one who comes out of himself, who ceases to be himself and becomes another person.

Instead of this exterior world, to which Balzac adapts himself, Aurore talks to us of an inner world, emanating from her own fancy, the reflection of her own imagination, the echo of her own heart, which is really herself.  This explains the difference between Balzac’s impersonal novel and George Sand’s personal novel.  It is just the difference between realistic art, which gives way to the object, and idealistic art, which transforms this according to its own will and pleasure.

Up to this time George Sand’s ideas had not been put on to paper.  Both Corambe and the stories composed between four chairs were merely fancies of a child’s mind.  Aurore soon began to write, though.  She had composed two novels while in the convent, one of which was religious and the other a pastoral story.  She was wise enough to tear them both up.  On leaving the convent she wrote another novel for Rene’ de Villeneuve, and this shared the same fate.  In 1827, she wrote her Voyage en Auvergne, and in 1829, another novel.  In her Histoire de ma vie she says of this:  “After reading it, I was convinced that it was of no value, but at the same time I was sure I could write a better one. . . .  I saw that I could write quickly and easily, and without feeling any fatigue.  The ideas that were lying dormant in my mind were quickened and became connected, by my deductions, as I wrote.  With my meditative life, I had observed a great deal, and had understood the various characters which Fate had put in my way, so that I really knew enough of human nature to be able to depict it.”  She now had that facility, that abundance of matter and that nonchalance which were such characteristic features of her writing.

When George Sand began to publish, she had already written a great deal.  Her literary formation was complete.  We notice this same thing whenever we study the early work of a writer.  Genius is revealed to us, perhaps, with a sudden flash, but it has been making its way for a long time underground, so that what we take for a spontaneous burst of genius is nothing but the final effort of a sap which has been slowly accumulating and which from henceforth is all-powerful.

George Sand had to go through the inevitable period of feeling her way.  We are glad to think that the first book she published was not written by herself alone, so that the responsibility of that execrable novel does not lie solely with her.

On the 9th of March, 1831, George Sand wrote to Boucoiran as follows:  “Monstrosities are in vogue, so we must invent monstrosities.  I am bringing forth a very pleasant one just at present. . . .”  This was the novel written in collaboration with Sandeau which appeared under the signature of Jules Sand towards the end of 1831.  It was entitled, Rose et Blanche, ou la Comedienne et la Religieuse.