Career
The book was published by Northern Illinois University Press in 2012 in English translation by Doctor Ursula Phillips. Letters to friends and family written by Żmichowska were published in five volumes by Wrocław University in 1960. There, she also expressed interest in a married man, Edward Dembowski, which led to a known scandal.
Her correspondence with Bibianna Moraczewska (an unmarried woman by choice like Narcyza) spanning 32 years consisted mostly of intellectual discourses.
Żmichowska became governess for the noble House of Zamoyski in 1838. On his advice, she enrolled at the Bibliothèque Nationale, and became one of the first women at the French Academy ever.
Her stay in France completely changed Żmichowska. She began to publicly express her radicalized views about women.
Dubbed by her bourgeois surroundings as "an excentric".
She smoked cigars, which was prohibited to women. Her perfect knowledge of French enabled Narcyza to find new employment easily upon her return to occupied Poland. She became governess to four children of Stanisław Kisielecki at an estate near Łomża.
She travelled to Warsaw frequently, where she met with other intellectuals.
She debuted in the literary magazine Pierwiosnek (Primrose), and wrote regularly for other Polish magazines under the Russian censorship including Pielgrzym (edited by Eleonora Ziemięcka) and Przegląd Naukowy, where other women published as well. Żmichowska founded a group of Suffragettes in Warsaw active in 1842–1849, who also took part in anti-Tsarist activities.
She was arrested by the Russians in Lublin and sentenced to three years in prison in 1849 for her membership in the delegalized Związek Narodu Polskiego (place).