Caroline de la Motte Fouqué was one of the most widely read female authors of the Romantic period. A recurring theme in her multifaceted work is the social role of women, especially in times of crisis. While Fouqué assigns men to a volatile sphere of politics, she sees women as the image of a timeless nature.

There is no reactionary attitude behind this. Rather, Fouqué enhances the traditional image of women. She concedes to women the ability to understand the forces of nature and to harmonize social upheavals with the laws of nature. According to Fouqué, the changeable men are incapable of this harmonization. This is also proven by her novel Magic of Nature from 1812, which tells the story of the aristocratic Villeroi family against the backdrop of the French Revolution. Here, too, it is the female characters who are able to adapt 'naturally' to the radical social upheavals. Through their care and wisdom, they uphold humanitarian values even in times of crisis and do not subordinate them to the changing times. In this spirit, Baroness Clairval knows exactly what time has come after her dangerous escape from the political unrest in France. While her brother-in-law, the Marquis de Villleroi, is still hoping for an early return to the absolutist "fatherland", the Baroness sees clearly:

“Do you believe that?” asked the baroness. “The gullible have been lying to themselves for years. Let them! The old things don't come back. Just as you and I can't live another twenty years, life as a whole doesn't move backwards. Political crises are insidious; nature of mind and body, everything goes in one direction. When the children grow out of their shoes, the moment of time outgrows forms. Dear Marquis, we may one day beg our way back to our fatherland, but the windfall is dead.”

In Fouqué's work, it is not the fathers, soldiers and rulers who are clairvoyant or clear-sighted, but the mothers, aunts and artists. In an age of revolutions, they stand up for continuity and strength of will and lay the foundations for peaceful coexistence. Fouqué and her female characters have their finger on the pulse of the times, but also know how to learn from the past.