George Sand, the pen name of Amantine Dupin, became the most popular writer in Europe by the age of 27, surpassing Honoré de Balzac and Victor Hugo. She was also known for multiple love affairs and breaking French law by wearing male attire and smoking in public. The press caricatured her as “half-man, half-woman,” and “George Sandism” became an insult to describe independent women. Sand’s political essays demonstrated her fierce support for the rights of women and the poor. Her novels, plays, and autobiographical essays were influential for contemporary and later authors, including Elizabeth Barrett Browning and Virginia Woolf.