Madame de Staël

Born in 1766 in Paris, she was a prominent French novelist, philosopher, and political theorist. She held a moderate stance during the French Revolution and Napoleonic era. Her presence at key events such as the 1789 Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen highlighted her political engagement, yet she was exiled from France for extended periods, first during the Terror and then by Napoleon’s personal persecution of her. While in exile, she formed the Coppet Group, an intellectal and literary network across Europe. Her own literary works had an important impact on European intellectual and literary thought, with her support of Romanticism. She died in Paris in 1817, aged 51.