A Cyclopaedia of Female Biography/Duras, Duchess of
DURAS, DUCHESS OF.
A modern French authoress, best known from her novel "Aurika." She was the daughter of a Captain in the navy. Count Corsain. During the French revolution, in 1793, she left France and came with her father to England. There she married the refugee Duke Duras, a firm royalist. In the year 1800, she returned with her husband to France, where she made the acquaintance of Madame de Staël, and commenced her labours in a literary circle, composed of the greatest minds of the country. When Louis the Eighteenth returned to France, he called her husband to his court, and gave him a place near his person. The duchess, although now a great favourite at court, devoted much of her time to a school which she established, and in superintending several benevolent societies of which she was an active member. Her novel "Aurika," in which she attacks, in a firm but gentle way, the prejudices of the nobility of birth, made quite a sensation, and was translated in several countries. Her next work "Edward," was not quite equal to the first. She died in the year 1828.