As soon as you cross the threshold of the house, the charm sets in: the large hall where, as a child, she was greeted by her grandmother, the boudoir where she wrote her first novel "with her nose in the closet", the puppet theater, the furniture, the objects in which she lived, everything contributes to revive this committed woman that was George Sand.
"This land of Nohant where I was brought up, where I spent all my life" - Story of my life
It was in this 41th century house, acquired by her grandmother, that she spent about XNUMX years, more than half of her life.
Throughout her essentially Berry childhood, little Aurore, who would become a writer under the pseudonym of George Sand, “gathered” treasures… she lived with and among small peasants: she looked after the flocks in the fields, learned to farm. 'a hazel stick a flutiau, or will pick up the larks trapped in the snow… It is a daily communication with the earth, nature and the people.
She crisscrosses the country mounted on her mare Colette, going to mass at St Chartier, crunching the imposing Sarzay keep, the Montgivray bridge or getting lost in the heathland ...
Little Aurora observes, listens and records everything. All this treasure that she collects will be a permanent source of inspiration, so she will then give a large place to the landscapes, customs and traditions of this country, in novels like La Mare au Diable, La Petite Fadette, The Fine Gentlemen of Bois Doré, François le Champi, Nanon ...
George Sand, a committed woman
This house is the part of his writing work. A prolific author, she devotes part of her work to a struggle for social change, defending republican values all her life. She created newspapers and was actively involved in the attempt to establish a democratic government in 1848, under the Second Republic. Around the dining room table, always set, we are remaking the world!
The community of artists or "the cenacle" of Nohant
George Sand opens his house to creators, organizing life in Nohant according to their needs, creating an atmosphere of collective and yet free life that enriches everyone's work. The salon is still based on discussions, readings aloud and music from the artists, men of letters, politicians, theater people who have gathered there: Franz Liszt, Marie d'Agoult, Balzac, Dumas fils, Chopin, Théophile Gautier , Flaubert, Delacroix ...
“Nohant… is in my heart and in my thoughts like one of the rare places where everything delights me, captivates me and consoles me”. (Delacroix, 1846).
Frederic Chopin There is a very special place there, since he spent 9 summers there alongside the novelist and composed the majority of her work there: Waltz of the Little Dog, Barcarolle ...
Every summer, in June, then in July, the “Nohant Festival Chopin” takes place in the old sheepfold, transformed into a concert hall, to continue making music resonate there.
Do not forget the visit of the puppets!
From the years 1846, George Sand will spend the winters more regularly in Nohant. The Berry is landlocked and does not offer as many distractions as in Paris. To fill the long winter evenings, Sand has the idea of acting as a family. Everyone participates, one creating the sets, the other the costumes, it is also a laboratory for plays staged in Paris ... thus two theaters are born, which should not be missed: the theater of the great actors and the one puppets. A total of a hundred are now on display above the welcome shop: Balandard, head of the troop, Colombine or the extraordinary chimera await us there!
A remarkable and romantic garden
Whatever the season, the garden invites you to get lost in the thickets; first a tour of the side of the two cedars planted by the novelist at the birth of her children, stroll in the winding alleys of the English garden, where you can sometimes see Corambé, a little character that the author, as a child , had been invented and finally passage in the family cemetery where the great lady rests.
George Sand, undisputed godmother of this region "the Black Valley"
Nohant nestles in the heart of a bocage landscape that the writer called "the Black Valley". This region, straight out of his imagination, had not been isolated on a map by any geographer. It occupies a central place in the life and work of George Sand: "It seemed to me that the Black Valley was myself, it was the setting, the garment of my own existence". It is for her a perpetual source of inspiration.
To his friends George Sand offers the beauties of his Berry: rides in the trains, walks on the banks of the Creuse, visits to Petit Coudray….
"Sometimes, taking all my brood in a country bench chariot, for 2 or 3 days, lost in the sun and in the rain on terrible roads, we would arrive laughing and hungry at some magnificent site…"
So, you too go in the footsteps of George Sand, you may discover the famous Devil's Pond at the bend of a path in the wood of Chanteloube!
Pratical information
January to December except 01/01, 01/05, 01/11, 11/11 and 25/12
02 54 31 06 04
www.maison-george-sand.monuments-nationaux.fr