Alfred De Musset

Author profile

born

December 11, 1810 in Paris, France

died

May 02, 1857

gender

male

genre

Poetry, Literature & Fiction

About this author

edit data

Alfred Louis Charles de Musset-Pathay (11 December 1810 – 2 May 1857) was a French dramatist, poet, and novelist. Along with his poetry, he is known for writing La Confession d'un enfant du siècle (The Confession of a Child of the Century, autobiographical) from 1836.
Musset was born on 11 December 1810 in Paris. His family was upper-class but poor and his father worked in various key government positions, but never gave his son any money. His mother was similarly accomplished, and her role as a society hostess, - for example her drawing-room parties, luncheons, and dinners, held in the Musset residence - left a lasting impression on young Alfred.
Early indications of Musset's boyhood talents were seen by his fondness for acting impromptu min...more Alfred Louis Charles de Musset-Pathay (11 December 1810 – 2 May 1857) was a French dramatist, poet, and novelist. Along with his poetry, he is known for writing La Confession d'un enfant du siècle (The Confession of a Child of the Century, autobiographical) from 1836.
Musset was born on 11 December 1810 in Paris. His family was upper-class but poor and his father worked in various key government positions, but never gave his son any money. His mother was similarly accomplished, and her role as a society hostess, - for example her drawing-room parties, luncheons, and dinners, held in the Musset residence - left a lasting impression on young Alfred.
Early indications of Musset's boyhood talents were seen by his fondness for acting impromptu mini-plays based upon episodes from old romance stories he had read. Years later, elder brother Paul de Musset would preserve these, and many other details, for posterity, in a biography on his famous younger brother.
Alfred de Musset entered the collège Henri IV at the age of nine, where in 1827 he won the Latin essay prize in the Concours général. With the help of Paul Foucher, Victor Hugo's brother-in-law, he began to attend, at the age of 17, the Cénacle, the literary salon of Charles Nodier at the Bibliothèque de l'Arsenal. After attempts at careers in medicine (which he gave up owing to a distaste for dissections), law, drawing, English and piano, he became one of the first Romantic writers, with his first collection of poems, Contes d'Espagne et d'Italie (1829, Tales of Spain and Italy). By the time he reached the age of 20, his rising literary fame was already accompanied by a sulphurous reputation fed by his dandy side.
He was the librarian of the French Ministry of the Interior under the July Monarchy. During this time he also involved himself in polemics during the Rhine crisis of 1840, caused by the French prime minister Adolphe Thiers, who as Minister of the Interior had been Musset's superior. Thiers had demanded that France should own the left bank of the Rhine (described as France's "natural boundary"), as it had under Napoleon, despite the territory's German population. These demands were rejected by German songs and poems, including Nikolaus Becker's Rheinlied, which contained the verse: "Sie sollen ihn nicht haben, den freien, deutschen Rhein ..." (They shall not have it, the free, German Rhine). Musset answered to this with a poem of his own: "Nous l'avons eu, votre Rhin allemand" (We've had it, your German Rhine).
The tale of his celebrated love affair with George Sand, which lasted from 1833 to 1835, is told from his point of view in his autobiographical novel, La Confession d'un Enfant du Siècle (The Confession of a Child of the Century, made into a film, Children of the Century), and from her point of view in her Elle et lui. Musset's Nuits (1835–1837, Nights) trace his emotional upheaval of his love for George Sand, from early despair to final resignation. He is also believed to be the author of Gamiani, or Two Nights of Excess (1833), a lesbian erotic novel, also believed to be modeled on George Sand.

Tomb of Alfred de Musset in Père Lachaise Cemetery
Musset was dismissed from his post as librarian by the new minister Ledru-Rollin after the revolution of 1848. He was however appointed librarian of the Ministry of Public Instruction in 1853.
Musset received the Légion d'honneur on 24 April 1845, at the same time as Balzac, and was elected to the Académie française in 1852 (after two failures to do so in 1848 and 1850).
Alfred de Musset died in his sleep on 2 May 1857. The cause was heart failure, the combination of alcoholism and a longstanding aortic insufficiency. One symptom that had been noticed by his brother was a bobbing of the head as a result of the amplification of the pulse; this was later called de Musset's sign. He was buried in Père Lachaise Cemetery in Paris.(less)

combine editions
Books by Alfred De Musset

Average rating: 3.50 · 840 ratings · 32 reviews · 115 distinct works

	On ne badine pas avec l'amour 3.51 avg rating — 236 ratings — published 1833 — 19 editions	My rating:
	Lorenzaccio 3.60 avg rating — 241 ratings — published 1834 — 18 editions	My rating:
	La confession d'un enfant du siècle 3.62 avg rating — 118 ratings — published 1836 — 41 editions	My rating:
	Les Caprices de Marianne 3.18 avg rating — 44 ratings — published 1999 — 9 editions	My rating:
	Gamiani, or Two Nights of Excess 3.38 avg rating — 42 ratings — published 1998 — 17 editions	My rating:
	Fantasio 3.18 avg rating — 22 ratings	My rating:
	Il Ne Faut Jurer de Rien 3.24 avg rating — 17 ratings — published 2006 — 3 editions	My rating:
	Les Caprices de Marianne, suivi de "On ne badine pas avec l'amour" 3.08 avg rating — 13 ratings — published 2000	My rating:
	Emmeline 2.86 avg rating — 7 ratings — published 2007	My rating:
	Poesies Completes by Alfred De Musset, Frank Lestringant 3.38 avg rating — 8 ratings — published 1933 — 2 editions	My rating:

More books by Alfred De Musset…

Quotes by Alfred De Musset

“How glorious it is – and also how painful – to be an exception. ”
― Alfred De Musset

1,068 people liked it

“You’re like a lighthouse shining beside the sea of humanity, motionless: all you can see is your own reflection in the water. You’re alone, so you think it’s a vast, magnificent panorama. You haven’t sounded the depths. You simply believe in the beauty of God’s creation. But I have spent all this time in the water, diving deep into the howling ocean of life, deeper than anyone. While you were admiring the surface, I saw the shipwrecks, the drowned bodies, the monsters of the deep”
― Alfred De Musset, Lorenzaccio

tags: decadence , decadent , god , life

28 people liked it

“Man is a pupil, pain is his teacher.”
― Alfred De Musset

20 people liked it

See all Alfred De Musset's quotes »

Alfred's Fans (20)

Alfred De Musset

Author profile

combine editionsBooks by Alfred De Musset

Quotes by Alfred De Musset

combine editions
Books by Alfred De Musset