The World's First Children's Magazine and Europe's Governess

Abstract

Marie Leprince de Beaumont (1711–1780) was a French governess, fairy-tale and essay writer, and author of epistolary novels, as well as the founder, writer, and editor of *Le Magasin des enfants ou Dialogues entre une sage gouvernante et ses élèves* (Children’s Magazine, or Dialogues Between a Wise Governess and Her Pupils), which was published in England beginning in 1756. Although numerous works on the history of education and childhood have commemorated her colourful and multifaceted life and her 70-volume body of work – mostly related to the education of children and women – our experience nevertheless confirms that her life’s work and influence are not sufficiently known to today’s Hungarian readers. This study, which fits within the framework of the history of education and culture and is structured using a synchronic approach, presents the career of the writer, educator, and editor by drawing on an analysis of scholarly literature and sources in French, English, Spanish, and Hungarian scholarly literature and source analysis to present the career of this writer, educator, and editor; her pedagogical ideas; the history of the world’s first children’s newspaper; and its reception and influence in Europe and even beyond the continent’s borders. Articles from the contemporary European and Hungarian press, the educator’s correspondence and essays, individual issues of her children’s magazine, and private library catalogues (such as the materials from the Teleki Library in Marosvásárhely) formed the basis of our research. Among our research objectives was an analytical review of Madame Beaumont’s writings on the education of girls and, more broadly, on women’s social and cultural opportunities. We also examined the background, circumstances, and content of her children’s magazine, as well as its reception in Europe and the United States. In our research, we placed particular emphasis on the reception of the author and her works in Hungary, as well as their translations, and we also explored how the French governess’s work served as an inspiration for the founders of Hungarian children’s magazines. In summary, we can conclude that, from the perspectives of the history of childhood, children’s literature, as well as from the perspective of girls’ education and women’s cultural development, Marie Leprince de Beaumont – whose fame and influence have faded into the background over the past century and a half – was highly significant in her own time and even throughout the 19th century, and her body of work clearly has a place in the canon of the history of education.