A Daughter of the Seine: The Life of Madame Roland by Jeanette Eaton (published by 1929) is a fictionalized biography of a significant French woman during the violent French Revolution. Marie-Jeanne “Manon” Phlipon was a woman of Paris. As a child, her brightness was soon discovered. She studied every subject, including history, mathematics, agriculture, and especially philosophy. As a woman in 1700s France, however, her life options were limited. For this reason, as a young woman she found an influential man to marry, the economist Jean-Marie Roland de la Platière, in order to work as a part of an influential team in French politics and society.
Her husband was much older than she was, and it seemed clear that from Madame Roland’s part there was little love between them, although Madame Roland had plenty of respect and appreciation for him. Theirs was an intellectual partnership. In the first years of their marriage, they lived a calm provincial life, where Monsieur Roland served on the city council. With Manon’s encouragement, they headed back to Paris as the French Revolution began. Monsieur Roland was a part of the Girondist government and Madame played a strong role in society. She spoke, wrote, and supported her husband in all his political decisions and in speaking about important issues.
I am not familiar with the specific politics of the French Revolution, so some aspects of this were difficult for me to understand. I did learn much more about the Girondins versus the other Jacobin party, the “Mountain” or Montagnards. Looking at the book through modern eyes, I knew this meant that the Rolands would be a group that would soon be overshadowed by the more extreme wing of the party.
The Rolands wanted revolution, but did not agree with the bloody violence of the others. As such, when the Montagnards, led by Robespierre, gained dominance in the general assembly, anyone connected with the Girondist government was tried for treason and executed. This included Madame, since her husband had been Minister of the Interior and since she had acted as a spokesperson and host for the party’s political ideas. Monsieur had fled for his life, and Madame’s daughter had been taken to safety. But Madame Roland held her head high as she refused to leave and subsequently lost her head to the Guillotine.
Daughter of the Seine was awarded a Newbery Honor in 1930, which brought attention to it as a worthy book for children. Although it did begin by talking about Manon as a child, it quickly progressed into a more detailed account of Manon’s adult life and influence in politics. I doubt many children in 1929 were familiar with these political issues, but maybe I would have been surprised. Parts of the book read with an exciting feel, but for the most part, it was a lot of discussion about who went where and when.
Also, at the end of her life, before her execution, Madame had a romantic relationship. Although this book insists that the two had not actually been together, it does say that Madame did admit her attraction to her husband and was quite jealous and upset about it. (Call me skeptical, but I suspect that this 30-year-old woman did have a relationship, since her husband was nearing 60 by now and was in ill health for most of their marriage.) Anyway, that relationship and the details of her other relationships with men did make it seem remarkably not like a children’s novel by the end. Maybe young adult scholars would be okay with these details.
Wikipedia does note that Madame’s autobiography, which she wrote while in jail during the last months of her life, as well as a thousand letters that Madame wrote, have been used extensively to learn about the progress of the French Revolution. The author of Daughter of the Seine quotes from letters and from Madame’s autobiography. As such, the book seemed like a more factual biography at points, despite the fact that full conversations of dialogue were recounted at other points (making it not a factual biography). It was not a satisfying read as a Newbery Honor book. Although it’s not bad, I don’t recommend it for children or young adults today, unless they have a deep and abiding passion for the French Revolution.
(Wow, for a book I didn’t particularly like, I sure wrote a lot about it!)
This book entered the public domain on January 1, 2025.
