Everything about Alexandre Dumas Fils totally explained
Alexandre Dumas, fils (French for son, similar to Junior in English) (
July 27,
1824 –
November 27,
1895) was the
son of
Alexandre Dumas, père, who followed in his father's footsteps becoming a celebrated
writer,
author and
playwright.
Biography
Alexandre Dumas, fils was born in
Paris,
France, the
illegitimate child of Marie-Laure-Catherine Labay (
1794 –
1868), a
dressmaker, and novelist
Alexandre Dumas. In
1831 his father legally recognized him and ensured the young Dumas received the best education possible at the
Institution Goubaux and the
Collège Bourbon. At that time, the law allowed the elder Dumas to take the child away from his mother. Her agony inspired Dumas
fils to write about tragic female characters. In almost all of his writings, he emphasized the moral purpose of literature and in his
1858 play,
Le fils naturel (
The Illegitimate Son), he espoused the belief that if a man fathers an illegitimate child, then he's an obligation to legitimize the child and marry the woman.
Dumas' paternal great-grandparents were a white French nobleman and a young black
Haitian woman. In the boarding schools, Dumas
fils was constantly taunted by his classmates. These issues all profoundly influenced his thoughts, behaviour, and writing.
In
1844 Dumas
fils moved to
Saint-Germain-en-Laye to live with his father. There, he met
Marie Duplessis, a young
courtesan who would be the inspiration for his romantic novel,
La dame aux camélias (
The Lady of the Camellias). Adapted into a play, it was titled in English (especially in the United States) as
Camille and is the basis for
Verdi's 1853 opera,
La Traviata. Although he admitted that he'd done the adaptation because he needed the money, he'd a huge success with the play. Thus began the playwriting career of Dumas
fils which not only eclipsed that of his father during his lifetime but also dominated the serious French stage for most of the second half of the nineteenth century. After this, he virtually abandoned the novel (though his semi-autobiographical
L'Affaire Clemenceau (1867) achieved some success).
On
31 December 1864, Alexandre Dumas
fils married Nadjeschda von Knorring (
1826 – April
1895), daughter of Johan Reinhold von Knorring and wife, and widow of Alexander, Prince Naryschkine, whom he married at
Moscow and with whom he'd two daughters: Marie-Alexandrine-Henriette Dumas, born
20 November 1860, who married Maurice Lippmann and was the mother of Serge Napoléon Lippmann (
1886 –
1975) and Auguste Alexandre Lippmann (
1881 –
1960); and Jeanine Dumas (
3 May 1867–), who married Ernest d' Hauterive (
1864 –
1957), son of George Lecourt d' Hauterive and wife (married in
1861) Léontine de Leusse. After Naryschkine's death, he married in June
1895 Henriette Régnier de La Brière (
1851 –
1934), without issue.
In
1874, he was admitted to the
Académie française and in
1894 he was awarded the
Légion d'honneur.
Alexandre Dumas
fils died at
Marly-le-Roi,
Yvelines, on
November 27,
1895 and was interred in the
Cimetière de Montmartre in
Paris. His grave is, perhaps coincidentally, only some 100 metres away from that of Marie Duplessis.
Bibliography
Novels
Opera
Verdi's La Traviata was based on the novel The Lady of the Camellias
Plays
Atala (1848)
La Dame aux camélias (1852)
Diane de Lys (1853)
Le Bijou de la reine (1855)
Le Demi-monde (1855)
La Question d'argent (1857)
Le Fils naturel (The Illegitimate Son or The Natural Son, 1858)
Un Père prodigue (1859)
Un Mariage dans un chapeau (1859) coll. Vivier
L'Ami des femmes (1864)
Le Supplice d'une femme (1865) coll. Emile de Girardin
Heloise Paranquet (1866) coll. Durentin
Les Idees de Madame Aubray (1867)
Le Filleul de Pompignac (1869) coll. Francois
Une Visite de noces (1871)
La Princesse Georges (1871)
La Femme de Claude (1873)
Monsieur Alphonse (1873)
L'étrangère (1876)
Les Danicheff (1876) coll. de Corvin
La Comtesse Romani (1876) coll. Gustave Fould
La Princesse de Bagdad (1881)
Denise (1885)
Francillon (1887)Further Information
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