Roosevelt became acquainted with important figures in the world of literature and the arts, including (in addition to Longfellow) Giuseppe Verdi, Victorien Sardou, Wilkie Collins, Gustave Doré and Guy de Maupassant, whose mistress she became in 1884. Roosevelt's first books were "The Home Life of Henry W. Longfellow" (1882), the novel "Stage-struck; or, She would be an Opera Singer" (1884), and "The Life and Reminiscences of Gustave Doré" (1885, for which she was reportedly the first American woman honored by the French Academy), and another novel, "The Copper Queen" (1886), which was adapted for the stage by Sardou.