Edgar Quinet
Edgar Quinet (born February 17, 1803 in Bourg-en-Bresse , † March 27, 1875 in Paris ) was a French writer and historian .
As the only child of Jérôme Quinet and Eugénie Rozat Lagis, he experienced a lonely childhood, during which his mother exerted a great influence on him. His parents sent Edgar Quinet to school, first in Bourg and later in Lyon. The father wanted his son to have a military career, but the young Edgar was more drawn to literature.
His first work was Tablettes du juif errant . He was enthusiastic about Herder's history of philosophy, which he began to translate. For this purpose he learned German. He published his translation in 1827 and received great praise. Fascinated by romantic Germany, Quinet left France and moved to Heidelberg to study . There he was u. a. Student of Georg Friedrich Creuzer . 1834 married Quinet in the Rheinpfalz , the pastor's daughter Wilhelmina Elisabetha ( "Minna") Moré from Green City , daughter of the notary Philipp Nicolaus Moré. After the death of his first wife in March 1851, Quinet married Hermione Ghikère Asaky (1821-1900), daughter of the Moldovan poet Gheorghe Asachi (1788-1869), on July 21, 1852 in Brussels. His second wife had heard Quinet's lectures at the Collège de France and had been widowed since 1849. During his time at the Collège de France he met Victor Cousin and Jules Michelet . In 1846 he was relieved of his reading activities on Guizot's advice . After the February Revolution in 1848 he was allowed to return. He toured Germany and England before publishing his work. Cousin got him a job to take part in scientific research in Morée in 1828. After his return he published "Modern Greece".
In Paris, where he is buried on the Cimetière Montparnasse , a boulevard and a metro station bear his name. A street in the city center of the Romanian capital Bucharest also bears his name.
A well-known quote from Edgar Quinet reads: Instinct is the enduring essence of the species.
literature
- Gustave Vapereau , Dictionnaire universel des contemporains, Hachette, Paris, 1880, pp. 1491f. digitized
Web links
- Literature by and about Edgar Quinet in the catalog of the German National Library
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Quinet, Edgar |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | French writer and historian |
| DATE OF BIRTH | February 17, 1803 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Bourg-en-Bresse |
| DATE OF DEATH | March 27, 1875 |
| Place of death | Paris |