Alexandre Soumet

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Alexandre Soumet (1786–1845)

Alexandre Soumet (born January 29, 1786 in Castelnaudary , † March 30, 1845 in Paris ) was a French writer and member of the Académie française .

life and work

The early romantic

Soumet came from an upper -class family from Castelnaudary (a municipality between Carcassonne and Toulouse ). Since he failed to enter the École polytechnique around 1805 , he gave in to his poetic inclinations in Paris. With poems on the glory of Napoleon , he achieved the post of auditor (lowest level) in the Council of State in 1810. In 1814 he returned to his homeland in the south of France, where he was awarded by the Académie des Jeux Floraux and in 1818 rose to be a member ( mainteneur ) in Toulouse . In 1819 he moved back to Paris, came together with his friend Alexandre Guiraud through the mediation of Jules de Rességuier to Victor Hugo and joined the first romantic Cénacle (circle of friends), which also included Émile Deschamps , Victor Hugo and Alfred de Vigny . In 1824 he was among the founders of the romantic magazine La Muse française .

As a playwright in the Académie française

From 1822 he was successful with tragedies, especially with Clytemnestre , in which the role of Orestes was played by Talma . This made him popular with the king, who hired him as a librarian at Saint-Cloud Castle and later at Rambouillet Castle . In 1824 he was elected to the Académie française (seat no. 27). He was also the royal librarian at Compiègne Palace during the July monarchy .

The late epic

Following the tragedy Norma performed in 1831 , for which Bellini wrote the opera music that same year , Soumet devoted himself for 10 years to a project that he had been preparing since 1814, his great romantic-Catholic epic La Divine Épopée , which echoes Dante , Milton and Klopstock and that feeds on an illuminist way of thinking, as represented by Novalis . It went through three editions.

After 1840 Soumet wrote several plays (together with his daughter Gabrielle Soumet Beuvain d'Altenheim, 1814–1886) and completed a second, this time national epic, Joan of Arc (published posthumously in 1846, printed at state expense). Soumet died in 1845 at the age of 59. In Toulouse and Carcassonne streets are named Rue Alexandre Soumet .

Works (selection)

Stage works

  • Clytemnestre , tragedy. 1822
  • Saül , tragédie. 1822.
  • Cléopâtre , tragédie 1824.
  • Joan of Arc , tragédie. 1825.
  • (with Jacques-François Ancelot and Alexandre Guiraud) Pharamond , opéra en trois actes. 1825. (Music by François-Adrien Boieldieu )
  • Le siège de Corinthe , tragédie lyrique. 1826. (as an opera by Gioachino Rossini 1828)
  • Emilia . 1827. (based on the novel Kenilworth by Walter Scott)
  • Le secret de la confession (later: Élisabeth de France ). 1828.
  • (with Louis Belmontet, 1798–1879) Une fête de Néron , tragédie. 1829. (continuation of Britannicus by Jean Racine )
  • Norma ou l'infanticide , tragedy. 1831. (as an opera by Bellini, Milan 1831)
  • (with Gabrielle Soumet) Le Gladiateur , tragédie. 1841.
  • (with Gabrielle Soumet) Le chêne du roi , comédie. 1841.
  • (with Gabrielle Soumet) Jane Gray , tragédie. 1844.
  • (with Félicien Mallefille, 1813–1868) David , opéra. 1846. (Music by Auguste Mermet, 1810–1889)

Epic poetry

  • La Divine Epopée . 2 vols. 1840, 1841, 1842. Geneva 1973.
  • Joan of Arc , trilogy nationale, dédiée à la France. 1846. (Foreword by Jules Lefèvre-Deumier, 1797–1857)

prose

  • "Les Scrupules littéraires de Mme la Baronne de Staël ou Réflexions sur quelques chapitres du livre" De l'Allemagne "(Paris, Delaunay, 1814)". In: Cahiers Staëliens 51, 2000, pp. 29-61 (digitized in Gallica). (also in: La Divine Épopée , Geneva 1973)

literature

  • Anna Beffort: Alexandre Soumet, sa vie et ses œuvres . Thèse Université de Paris 1908 (with knowledge of the birth certificate, names 1886 as the year of birth)
  • René Bray : Chronologie du romantisme 1804-1830 . Paris 1932, 1971.
  • Théophile Gautier : Histoire du romantisme . Paris 1874, pp. 187-190.
  • Daniel Madelénat: "Alexandre Soumet". In: Dictionnaire des écrivains de langue française . Edited by Jean-Pierre Beaumarchais, Daniel Couty and Alain Rey. Larousse, Paris 2001, pp. 1803-1804.
  • Karine Laffont: Philosophy, mythe et imagination dans l'œuvre dramatique et poétique d'Alexandre Soumet . Thèse Université Toulouse le Mirail - Toulouse II, 2012.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Rue Alexandre Soumet in Toulouse, In: google.maps (accessed August 7, 2020)
  2. ↑ Rue Alexandre Soumet in Carcassonne, In: google.maps (accessed August 7, 2020)
  3. ↑ Alexandre Soumet (Th. Gautier, 1870), In: fr.wikisource.org (French) (accessed August 7, 2020)
  4. ↑ Philosophy, mythe et imagination dans l'oeuvre dramatique et poétique d'Alexandre Soumet, by Karine Laffont, In: tel.archives-ouvertes.fr, 392 pages, (PDF, French) (accessed August 7, 2020)

Web links
personal data
SURNAME Soumet, Alexandre
BRIEF DESCRIPTION French writer and member of the Académie française
DATE OF BIRTH January 29, 1786
PLACE OF BIRTH Castelnaudary
DATE OF DEATH March 30, 1845
Place of death Paris