Leonora

Description of the book

Leonora by Maria Edgeworth is about the newly married Leonora and her decision to bring back to England a woman who had been exiled to France. The woman, Olivia, is known as a "coquette," and her controversial behavior about her marriage had driven her to France, where she cultivated an aristocratic, "French" sensibility that exists apart from conventional morality. Excerpt: "What a misfortune it is to be born a woman! In vain, dear Leonora, would you reconcile me to my doom? Condemned to incessant hypocrisy, or everlasting misery, a woman is the slave or the outcast of society. Confidence in our fellow creatures, or ourselves, alike forbidden us, to what purpose have we understandings, which we may not use? hearts, which we may not trust?"