The captivating biography of the eighteenth-century aristocrat who balanced the exacting demands of her society with a daring life of the mind. At eighteen, Gabrielle Emilie le Tonnelier de Breteuil, Marquise Du Châtelet (1706-1749) maried a nobleman and proceeded to do what was expected of French noblewoman of her time: bear children, advance her husband's carrer, and display herself at Versailles. But in the course of her short life, Du Châtelet would also conduct a fifteen-year liaison with the controversial (and lowborn)philosopher Voltaire, write her own philosophical works, and translate Newton's pioneering work the Principia. In Emilie Du Châtelet, Judith P. Zinsser captures the charm and restless ambition of this unconvecional woman as well as the glamour and artifice of her world.