Les noms d’Isabelle van Tuyll

Abstract:

Her name was Isabelle van Tuyll (or more precisely Isabella Agneta Elisabeth van Tuyll van Serooskerken), but she preferred to be known as Belle de Zuylen; other names she used, or which were used to designate her by friends, were Zélide and Agnès; after her marriage she would often sign herself as Tuyll de Charrière and in her later writings she used the pseudonym “Abbé de la Tour”. The present article suggests that a study of these different names is relevant to an understanding of Belle’s search for identity and to her intellectual and moral itinerary from her early aggressive optimistic rationalism to the more moderate views expressed in her later correspondence and imaginative writings.

SvD, January 2014

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• Publications > Belle de Zuylen Papers > 2013 > Courtney