Alexander dumas

Alexandre Dumas Davy de la Pailleterie (Villers-Cotterêts, July 24, 1802-Puys, near Dieppe, December 5, 1870), better known as Alexandre Dumas, and in Spanish-speaking countries as Alejandro Dumas, was a French novelist and playwright.

His son was also a well-known writer. Dumas senior's works have been translated into almost a hundred languages and he is one of the most widely read Frenchmen. Several of his historical adventure novels were published in series format, such as The Count of Monte Cristo, The Three Musketeers, Twenty Years Later, The Viscount of Bragelonne, The Black Tulip and Queen Margaret, among others. His novels have been adapted since the turn of the XX century into nearly two hundred films. A prolific writer in various genres, he began his career writing plays. He wrote magazine articles and travel books. His works number almost 100,000 pages.

His father, General Thomas-Alexandre Dumas, was a native of the French colony of Saint-Domingue, present-day Haiti, the son of the French nobleman Alexandre Antoine Davy de la Pailleterie and the slave of Sub-Saharan African descent Marie-Cessette Dumas. In addition to being the son of General Thomas Alexandre Davy de la Pailleterie, he was the son of Marie-Louise Elisabeth Labouret. When he was fourteen years old, Thomas-Alexandre was taken by his father to France, where he trained at a military academy and later joined the French army, where he forged a brilliant career.

His father's aristocratic rank helped Alexandre Dumas begin working for Louis-Philippe I of France. He then dedicated himself to writing, in which he succeeded very soon. Decades later, with the accession of Louis Napoleon Bonaparte in 1851, Dumas fell out of favor and went to Belgium, where he lived for several years. He traveled to Russia, where he lived for years before moving to Italy. In 1861 he founded and published the newspaper L'Indipendente, which supported the Italian unification effort. In 1864, he returned to Paris.

Despite being married, and in keeping with the tradition of upper-class Frenchmen at the time, Dumas had dozens of mistresses and at least four illegitimate children. One of them, Alexandre Dumas Jr., also became a renowned writer thanks in part to the support of his father. The English playwright Watts Phillips, who met Dumas at the end of his life, described the French writer as “the most generous human being with the biggest heart in the world. He was the most delicious and selfish creature on the face of the Earth: his tongue was like a windmill, once it started you never knew when it was going to stop, especially if the subject was himself."

The Black Earl's Son

His father, General Thomas-Alexandre Dumas, known as the Black Count, unsung hero of the French Revolution, was born in Haiti in 1762, the son of Alexandre Antoine Davy de la Pailleterie, an aristocrat from the Hexagon who left in seeks his fortune in the Caribbean and ends up ruined. During those dark thirty years he lived in free union with the black slave Marie-Césette Dumas. As Alexandre Antoine was presumed dead due to his prolonged absence, he had to return to recover his fortune after selling Thomas-Alexandre into slavery so he could get the money to go to France, but once he gets his inheritance back, he frees his son. and he takes him to the metropolis at the age of fourteen. There Thomas-Alexandre receives training at the Versailles fencing academy, quickly becoming one of the best swordsmen in the country. He enters the army as a private and during the revolution he takes advantage of the officer vacancies left by the executed or exiled noblemen and manages in one year to become the first mulatto general of a western army. His performance as a strategist was so remarkable that a statue was erected in his honor in Paris, destroyed in 1940 by the Nazis during their occupation of France; but the general's name is engraved among those of other French national heroes on column 23 of the Arc de Triomphe. The general dies of cancer at the age of forty-three, when Alexandre Dumas was four years old.

A recent investigation by New York writer and journalist Tom Reiss into the life of Alexandre Dumas, compiled in his book The Black Count, reveals that the experiences of Dumas's father, General Thomas Alexandre Dumas, were the inspiration for a large part of The Count of Monte Cristo and The Three Musketeers.

Childhood and youth

Given the pension available to his mother, Dumas received little school education. With some deficient studies he began to work as a messenger, a tobacco seller and as a notary's intern. Dumas had an indomitable and dreamy character, he spent his time hunting and courting girls his age.

Alejandro Dumas in his youth

In 1822 he made his first trip to Paris, financed with the proceeds of hunting. He was fascinated by the city and the theater. For this reason, a few months later he decided to return with some letters of recommendation for his father's old friends, almost all of them attached to the Bourbons.

In 1823, he settled in Paris and entered the service of the Duke of Orleans as a clerk, thanks to his perfect penmanship and General Foy's recommendation. He continues to write and complete his training in a self-taught way. In 1825 his first vaudeville premiered, Hunting and Love and in 1826 he published his first prose novel, Blanche de Beaulieu.

Early works

With the representation, by the Comédie française in 1830, of Henry III and his court, he achieved great notoriety and, in 1831, with Antony he achieved his first success. Success that will continue throughout his literary career with his favorite genre: drama and historical novel. It is said that he was the introducer of Romanticism in the French theater, showing proud characters of his own.

He divided his time between work, study and love, which in 1824 surprised him with a son, Alexandre Dumas Jr., the result of his romance with the seamstress Marie-Catherine Lebay. On March 5, 1831, Marie-Alexandrine came into the world, the result of her relationship with the actress Belle Krebsamer, who forced him to recognize the newborn, as well as her firstborn.

In 1832 Dumas made his first trip abroad (Switzerland). Italy (1835), Belgium and Germany (1838) followed. Thus he began his production of travel diaries. Also in 1838 he suffered the loss of his mother, to whom he always devoted his greatest care. In 1840 he married the actress Ida Ferrer. Although her marriage did not last long, he continued to be linked to her due to legal and financial issues.

On the cusp

He is a prolific author (tragedies, dramas, melodramas, adventures...) although, to meet the growing public demand, he had to resort to the notorious help of "collaborators" among which Auguste Maquet (1839-1851) stood out, who intervened in several of his novels, including some as notable as The Three Musketeers and The Count of Monte Cristo (1844). The discussion on this issue has come to an end thanks to the appearance of the ballot papers in which it is autographed that he was the one who found the Memories of D'Artagnan, the work of Gatien Courtilz de Sandras (edited by I started in 1961), the basis of his famous novel. It was Auguste Maquet who investigated the historical background and Alexandre Dumas who shaped the novel. Maquet would publish his own version shortly after, but both this and Gatien's are true literary monstrosities, while Alexandre Dumas's is very agile and funny ^{[citation needed ]} . His historical novels, full of vivacity, enjoyed the approval of the public, fostered by their publication, in installments, in newspapers.

Memorial Plate dedicated to Dumas in Madrid in 1846 (carrera de San Jerónimo, 10)

In 1846, when he was at the height of his career and his fame exceeded the borders of his native country, the French Minister of Public Instruction, M. de Salvandy, invited Dumas to travel to Algeria, where he was with his son and a group of friends. They toured Spain and then took the ship La Veloce in the port of Cádiz, which took them to Algeria and Tunisia. The experiences during those two trips are collected in his books From Paris to Cádiz and La Veloce.

He amassed a considerable fortune, which he squandered lavishly at parties and dinners. He had a castle built in Le Port-Marly called Monte-Cristo . For this he brought decorators from Algeria and bought the most expensive classical furniture. He supported his children, their mothers and several mistresses, many of them actresses. He lived in great luxury and waste; and although he came to earn enormous sums of money, he was always in debt.

Castle of Monte-Cristo

Economic decline

He took an active part in the Revolution of 1848, which got him involved in political problems. In that same year he broke his relationship with Maquet, who denounced him for having taken advantage of him. The judgment dictated that he had to pay her 145,200 francs in ten years. Besieged by creditors, he fled to Brussels in 1850, where he finished writing his Memoirs.

He returned to Paris in 1853 and embarked on various enterprises, each more ruinous. In 1847 he had founded the Théâtre Historique which, four years later, went bankrupt. He was also founder of the weekly Le Monte-Cristo (1857-1860) which also went bankrupt.

His "Travel Books" and "War Reports"

In 1858 he was invited by a wealthy Russian family on a pleasure trip, which took him to St. Petersburg, Moscow, Astrakhan, Baku, Georgia, and the shores of the Black Sea. That nine-month trip was of great benefit to his literary work. Upon his return he published several books on the subject, as well as translations of important Russian authors of that time.

In 1859 he traveled to Italy. There he met General Giuseppe Garibaldi, whom he joined in Sicily and helped with the purchase of arms in Marseille, which he himself would transport on his ship Emma. He then headed for the Holy Land. On the way there he receives the news that Garibaldi has landed in Naples, so he moves to Palermo, from where he begins to transmit to La Presse his writings on the situation of the war.. (The Garibaldinos).

After the victory, Garibaldi appointed Dumas Head of Excavations and Museums in Naples, where he lived until 1864. His book La San Felice is from that period and his other daughter was also born around those days Micaela, of his sentimental relationship with Emilia Cordier. In addition, in 1863 an unusual event occurred: on June 22, the Dumas, father and son, both suffered the condemnation of all their romantic novels by the Holy See and the consequent inclusion in the Index of Prohibited Books.

Alejandro Dumas, old man.

Old age and death

Despite old age and illness, Dumas's stories continued to fill the Paris newspapers. So, until his last days, his followers were able to enjoy The Knight Hector of Sainte-Hermine , his last novel published in installments in Le Moniteur Universal . Also from 1869 he worked on the compilation of cooking recipes from various countries that he had visited, to publish them in a large volume. That book was finished posthumously (1873), under the title Great Cooking Dictionary.

In 1870 Dumas took refuge in his son's country house in Puys, unable to return to the capital, besieged by the war with Prussia and his state of health. He dies of a heart attack on December 5, the same day the Prussians entered the town.

He published approximately 300 works and numerous articles, making him one of the most prolific and popular authors in France. His novels range from adventure to fantasy, going through history.

Works attributed to Dumas

On many occasions, for sales purposes, some works have been attributed to Dumas that were never written by him. The most notorious case is The Hand of the Dead, a continuation of The Count of Monte Cristo. This work was not written by Dumas, but by the Portuguese writer Alfredo Hogan.

The list of works attributed to Dumas is long, including Violet's novel, Portos's son, Confessions of the Marchioness, The Knights Templar, among others. Some published under his name are just translations, like Walter Scott's Ivanhoe. Another, of everlasting fame, is The Man in the Iron Mask, written by Emile Ladoucette, whose Dumas version can be found, as an essay, in his book Crimes celebres.

Poshumous recognition

Monument to Dumas in Paris

His remains were entombed in the cemetery of his hometown of Villers-Cotterêts until November 30, 2002, when French President Jacques Chirac ordered his burial in the Panthéon in Paris.

His body was exhumed and in a televised ceremony he was deposited in the mausoleum, along with other illustrious French writers. The French president acknowledged that this fact had not been carried out before due to the racism that prevailed in society and recognized that France has had many illustrious writers, but none as widely read as Dumas, since his books have been translated into more than a hundred Languages.

In his address, President Chirac said:

... With you, we were D'Artagnan, Monte Cristo or Balsamo; we gathered the streets of France, participated in battles, visited palaces and castles; with you, we dreamed...

Dumas also has a monument in the Place de Malesherbes in Paris, which was inaugurated in 1883. This statue was designed by Gustave Doré, and next to the bronze image of the writer, appears his most prominent figure, the famous musketeer D& #39;Artagnan.

There is also a museum in his name (and his son's) in Villers-Cotterêts.

Works

Short novels and short stories

• Cherubim and Celestine (1836)
• The cabriole carriole (1836)
• A mask dance (1836)
• Bernardo (1836)
• Don Martin de Freytas (1836)
• The priest Chambord (1836)
• Pascual Bruno (1838)
• Peter the cruel (1839)
• Monseñor Gaston Febus (1839)
• The evasive bird (1841)- Share the authorship with Joseph Méry.
• Praxede (1841)
• A soul to be born (1844)
• Erminia (1845)
• The priest of Boulogne (1851)
• Traveling stars of trade (1854)
• Mariana (1859)
• A trip to the moon (1860)
• Wish and possession (1861)

Children's stories and novels

• Captain Pánfilo (1839)
• Lyderic Adventures (1842)
• History of a Cascanueces (1844)
• The gachas of Countess Berta (1845)
• The Youth of Pierrot (1854)
• The king of the topos and his daughter (1858)
• The two brothers (1858)
• Giant hands (1858)
• San Juan Nepomuceno and the shoemaker (1858)
• Lovely whistle (1859)
• Man without tears (1859)
• The king of the bowls (1860)
• The vain (1861)

Novels

Cover The Corner Brothers

Cover The three musketeers

Cover The Count of Montecristo

List of works according to the bibliography of Hugo P. Thieme (1907).

• Paulina (1838)
• Actea (1839)
• Adventure of John Davys (1840)
• The master of arms (1840)
• Ascanio (1843)
• Georges (1843)
• The castle of Eppstein (1843)
• Sylvandira (1843)
• Amaury (1843)
• Cecilia de Marsilly (1844)
• The Corner Brothers (1844)
• Gabriel Lambert (1844)
• The three musketeers, trilogy D'Artagnan 1, (1844)
• The Count of Montecristo (1845)
• Twenty years later, trilogy D'Artagnan 2, (1845)
• Queen Margot, series Wars of religion 1, (1845). It has been translated with the title Queen Margarita, Margarita de Borgoñaand Margarita de Valois.
• The War of Women (1845)
• The Lady of Monsoreau, series Wars of religion 2, (1846) (Sequel to Queen Margot).
• The Agenor bastard of Mauleon (1846)
• Forty-five, series Wars of religion 3, (1847) (Sequel to the Lady of Monsoreau).
• The two Dianas. (1847)
• The Viscount of Bragelonne, trilogy D'Artagnan 3, (1848)
• The black tulip (1850)
• The mouth of hell (1850)
• God willing (1851)
• The pigeon (1851)
• Cleves Olympia (1852)
• The shooter. (1854)
• Captain Richard (1854)
• The Mohicans of Paris (1854-59)
• The Duke of Savoy (1855)
• The horoscope (1858)
• The wolves of Manchecoul (1859)
• Uncle ruins (1860)
• A lance of love (1860)
• The son of the priest (1860)
• One night in Florence (1861)
• The Earl of Moret (1865)
• The case of widow Lafarge (1866)
• Creation and redemption (1870)

Novels of travel impressions

• Travel Prints: In Switzerland (1833)
• Fifteen days in Sinai (1839)
• Travel Prints: South of France (1841)
• To the edge of the Rhin (1841)
• A year in Florence (1841)
• Captain Arena (1842)
• The Speronare (1842)
• The Corricolo (1843)
• The Palmieri villa (1843)
• From Paris to Cadiz (1847)
• The Veloce (1848)
• A Gil Blas in California (1852)
• Travel Prints: The Caucasus (1859)
• Travel Prints: In Russia (1860)
• The Way of Varennes (1860)

Horror novels

He called The Thousand and One Ghosts a group of stories that includes:

• Fontenay of roses (1849)
• The woman of the velvet necklace (1851)
• The will of M. de Chauvelin (1850)
• My grandfather's hare (1855)
• A meal at Rossini's. (1849)
• The marriages of Uncle Olifo (1849)
• Story of a dead man told by himself (1844)
• The pale lady (1849).

In addition, other horror works:

• Celebrities (1839-41). It's not about novels.
• Wonderful History of Don Bernardo de Zúñiga (1849)
• Captain of wolves (1857). Maybe the first novel about werewolf men.
• Black (1858)
• The island of fire (1860)

Historical novel

• Blanca de Beaulieu (1826)
• Galia and France (1833)
• Isabel de Baviera (1835)
• The Countess of Salisbury (1839)
• The knight of Harmental (1843) It has also been translated as "The Conspirators".
• A daughter of the regent (1844) (Sequel to the Knight of Harmental)
• José Balsamo, Memories of a Doctor, French Revolution Series 1, (1846)
• The Queen's Necklace, French Revolution Series 2, (1849)
• Regency (1849)
• The dramas of the sea (1851)
• Angel Pitou, series French Revolution 3, (1853)
• The Countess of Charny, French Revolution Series 4, (1853)
• The gentleman of the red house, French Revolution Series 5, (1853)
• Prussian terror (1867)
• The man in the iron mask (1867). This novel is part of the trilogy of the Three Musketeers. In the original French was the last volume of the Third Novel, the The Viscount of Bragelonne, but in its English and Spanish versions, many publications separated it as a separate novel.
• The Trilogy of Sainte-Hermine:
• Jéhu's colleagues (1857)
• Whites and blues (1867)
• The Knight Hector of Sainte-Hermine (1869). This work has been exhumed from the funds of the National Library of France and published for the first time in 2005, thanks to the compilation of Claude Schopp.

Novels about Italy

• Memories of Garibaldi (1860)
• The Garibaldines (1861)
• The Naples Bourbons (1862)
• La San Felice (1863-65) (3 volumes "La San Felice", "Emma Lyonna" and "El destino de la San Felice")

Novels about contemporary episodes

• Montevideo or a new Troy (1850)

Biographical novels

• Napoleon (1840)
• The Stuarts (1840)
• Juana de Arco (1842)
• Louis XIV and his century (1844)
• The Medicis (1845)
• Louis XV and his court (1849)
• Talma Memories (1850)
• Luis XVI and the Revolution (1850)
• The last king of the French (1852)
• Adventures of a comedian (1854)
• Julius Caesar (1855)
• Carlos the fool (1857)
• Memories of a favorite (1865)

Autobiographical novels

• My memories (1852-55)
• Stories of my animals (1868)
• Bric-A-Brac (1861)
• Talks or Causeries (1860)
• History of a lizard (1867)

Theater

• Henry III and his court (1829)
• Cristina (1830)
• Antony (theater) (1831)
• The tower of Nesle (1832)
• Catalina Howard (1834)
• Kean or Disorder and Genius (1836)
• Don Juan de Maraña (1836)
• Piquillo (1837)
• Caligula (1837)
• Mademoiselle de Belle-Isle (1839)
• The Count of Hermann (1849)

Orders

July Monarchy

• Knight of the Royal Order of the Legion of Honor.

Foreign

• First-class Knight of the Merit Decoration under the title of San Luis, (Lucca Duchy)
• Diner of the Spanish and American Order of Isabel la Católica. (Reino de España)