NECKER DE SAUSSURE, ALBERTINE-ADRIENNE

ne Albertine-adrienne De Saussure born 1766, Geneva died April 20, 1841, Valle du Salve, near Geneva Swiss woman of letters and author of a long-influential study on the education of women. She was the daughter of a distinguished Swiss naturalist, and she married a noted botanist who was the nephew and namesake of Louis XVI's finance minister, Jacques Necker. Her husband was a cousin of Germaine Necker de Stal, who became her friend and sometime collaborator. Reflecting her strongly religious orientation, the most important book of Mme Necker de Saussure, L'Education progressive, ou tude sur le cours de la vie, was a significant contribution to educational literature. The work was published in several volumes over the decade 182838; it was first translated into English (in part) in Boston (1835) and later (in full) in London (183943; 3 vol.). Other works include Notice sur la caractre et les crits de Mme de Stal (1820; A Review of the Character and the Writings of Mme de Stal) and a French translation of August Wilhelm von Schlegel's ber dramatische Kunst und Literatur (180911) as Cours de littrature dramatique, 3 vol. (1814).