GENETS, STEPHANIE-FELICITE DU CREST DE SAINT-AUBIN, COMTESSE DE (1746-183o), French writer and educator, was born at Champcery, Autun, France. At six years of age she was received as a canoness into the noble chapter of Alix, near Lyons, with the title of Madame la Comtesse de Lancy, taken from the town of Bourbon-Lancy. Her entire education, however, was conducted at home. In her 16th year she was married to Charles Brulart de Genlis, a colonel of grenadiers, who afterwards became marquis de Sillery. Some years later, through the influ ence of her aunt, Madame de Montesson, who had been clan destinely married to the duke of Orleans, she entered the Palais Royal as lady-in-waiting to the duchess of Chartres (177o). She acted with great energy and zeal as governess to the daughters of the family, and was in 1781 appointed by the duke of Chartres to the responsible office of gouverneur of his sons, a step which led to the resignation of all the tutors as well as to much social scandal. She wrote several works for the use of her pupils, the best known of which are the Theatre d'education (4 vols., 8o), a collection of short comedies for young people, Les Annales de la vertu (2 vols., 1781) and Adele et Theodore (3 vols.. 1782) . She anticipated many modern methods of teaching. His tory was taught with the help of magic lantern slides and her pu pils learnt botany from a practical botanist during their walks. Madame de Genlis welcomed the Revolution, but the fall of the Girondins in 1793 compelled her to take refuge in Switzerland along with her pupil Mademoiselle d'Orleans. In this year her husband, from whom she had been separated since 1782, was guillotined.
In 1794 Madame de Genlis fixed her residence at Berlin, but was expelled by order of King Frederick William, and afterwards settled in Hamburg, where she supported herself for some years by writing and painting. After the 18th Brumaire (1799) she returned to France, and was well received by Napoleon, who gave her apartments at the arsenal, and assigned her a pension of 6,000 francs. Her government pension was discontinued by Louis XVIII. Her Diners du Baron d'Holbach (1822), in which she set forth with a good deal of sarcastic cleverness the intolerance, the fanaticism, and the eccentricities of the "philosophes" of the 18th century, caused much discussion. She died on Dec. 31, 183o.
The numerous works of Madame de Geniis (which exceed 8o) owed much of their success to adventitious causes. They are useful, however (especially the voluminous Memoires inedits sur le XVIIIe siecle, io vols., 1825), as furnishing material for history. Most of her writings were translated into English almost as soon as they were published. A list of her works with useful notes is given by Querard in La France litteraire. Startling light was thrown on her relations with the duc de Chartres by the publication (19o4) of her correspondence with him in L'Idylle d'un "gouverneur" by G. Maugras. See also Sainte-Beuve, Causeries du lundi, vol. iii.; H. Austin Dobson, Four Frenchwomen (189o) ; W. de Chabreul, Gouverneur de princes, 1737-1830 (19oo) ; L. Chabaud, Les Precurseurs du f eminisme (19o1) ; Lettres inedites d ... Casimir Baecker, 1802-1830 (1902), edited by H. Lapauze; and T. Harmand, Madame de Geniis (1912)