CHARRIRE, ISABELLE-AGNS-LIZABETH DE

born Oct. 20, 1740, Zuilen, near Utrecht, Neth. died Dec. 27, 1805, Colombier, Switz. original name Isabella Agneta Elisabeth van Tuyll van Serooskerken, bynames Belle van Zuylen, Zlide, and Abb de la Tour Swiss novelist whose work anticipated early 19th-century emancipated ideas. She married her brother's Swiss tutor and settled at Colombier near Neuchtel. Influenced by Denis Diderot and Jean-Jacques Rousseau, she expressed views critical of aristocratic privilege, moral conventions (Trois Femmes, 1797; Three Women), religious orthodoxy, and poverty, though she was opposed to revolutionary radicalism (Lettres trouves sous la neige, 1794; Letters Found on the Snow). Her novels, of which the most important are Caliste, ou lettres crites de Lausanne (1786; Caliste, or Letters Written from Lausanne) and Lettres neuchteloises (1784; Letters of Neuchtel), abound in philosophical reflection, refined psychological observation, and local colour but lack coherent plots.