Astolphe de Custine

Astolphe Louis Léonor, marquis de Custine (Niderviller, March 18th 1790 - Paris, September 25th 1857) is a writer French, famous for its Lettres of Russia , sometimes considered as during for the Russia of the Essai Of the democracy in America of Tocqueville.

Biography

Astolphe is the second wire of Armand de Custine and Delphine de Sabran. Its family is affected hard by the Revolution: his/her grandfather, the revolutionary general Adam Philippe de Custine is guillotine in August 1793 and his father in January 1794, his mother is imprisoned with the Parisian prison of Holy-Pelagie, then with the Carmelite friars until the fall of Robespierre in July 1794.

In 1795, the family of Custine turns over to Lorraine. Astolphe passes then under the moral responsibility of its Alsatian tutor, named Bertoecher. His/her mother, Delphine de Custine, known for her intelligence and her great beauty, attend the literary living rooms, bind friendship with Madam de Staël which dedicates to him its novel Delphine and ties an love affair with François-Rene de Chateaubriand.

The disgrace of one of the dearest friends of Delphine de Custine, Joseph Fouché, Minister for the Police force of Napoleon i, causes the rupture of with the Empire in 1810. Then begin a European tour which carries out Astolphe and its mother in Germany and Switzerland in 1811, in Italy the following year. In 1814, Delphine and her son join in Basle Louis XVIII and the Count d' Artois which prepare the Restauration.

At this point in time Astolphe returns in the army and the diplomatic corps, attending the Congrès of Vienna at the sides of Charles-Maurice de Talleyrand-Périgord.

After several unfruitful attempts at engagement arranged by his/her diligent mother (of which Albertine de Staël, girl of Madam de Staël), it Marie, in 1821, in Léontine of Saint-Simon de Courtomer. A son, Enguerrand, are born from this union in June 1822. The summer of this same year, the marquis de Custine running away in England with Edouard of Holy-Bores, a six year old young man his junior met a few years before.

Léontine dies on July 7th, 1823 of an angina pectoris, leaving Astolphe a little freer of living its passion with Edouard of Holy-Bores.

October 28th 1824, the life of Custine is irremediably changed. Whereas it went to a amorous meeting with a soldier, it is attacked by the comrades in arms of this one, is beaten, stripped and given up unconscious on the paving stone. Its mishap is soon known of All-Paris and the sullied reputation of Custine. It is from now on, with its defending body, the reversed most famous of France. A board of guardians decides on his distance of the capital: Joined Custine, accompanied by Holy-Bores, the family field of Fervaques (the family castle of Niderviller, meanwhile, was sold).

The following years passed in romantic mobility with more or less of success. Heinrich Heine called Custine “a half-man of the letters.”

In 1832, Astolphe de Custine also makes build the Catinat castle with Saint-Gratien (Val-d'Oise) (it is shaven in 1860 by his heirs); it receives many artists there: Honore de Balzac, Victor Hugo, Frederic Chopin, Eugene Delacroix, François-Rene de Chateaubriand which was closely related to his/her mother during twenty years, Alfred de Musset, Jules Barbey d' Aurevilly, George Sand and Alphonse of Lamartine; there remains a building of dependences about it.

The princess Mathilde-Létizia Bonaparte, girl of Jerome Bonaparte, first of all spent her summers to the Catinat castle as a tenant of the Marquis de Custine. Then it bought in 1853 the castle built by the Count de Luçay (now called " Castle of the Mathilde" Princess;). She receives there, she also many writers and artists of the Second Empire: Prosper Mérimée, Théophile Gautier, Jules and Edmond de Goncourt, Gustave Flaubert, Alexandre Dumas.

He gains some recognition thanks to his accounts of voyage in Spain. The publication, in 1835, by Alexis de Tocqueville of Of the democracy in America whose final chapter prophesies that the future belongs to the United States and Russia, helps Custine to decide to undertake, in 1839, a voyage in Russia, mainly with Saint-Petersbourg but also Moscow and Iaroslavl.

Another explanation lies in the arrival, in Paris, of a young 23 years Polish count, Ignace Gurowski, who moves in the Parisian residence of Custine and Holy-Bores. It would be the latter which convinces Custine to undertake this voyage to convince the Tsar to put an end to the disgrace of the young man.

The Letters of Russia , published on May 13rd 1843, have an immediate and prolonged success: six republications will be born. The book is published in England, but prohibited in Russia. The description which it makes of the Tsar Nicolas Ier is not very flattering. He writes inter alia: if the Tsar does not have more pity in his heart than it does not express any in his policy, I lime pits Russia. On the other hand if its feelings are higher than its acts, I lime pits Tsar.

Ignace Gurowski, for its part, wife the infante Isabelle of Spain in 1842, causing the psychic depression of Custine, fortunately compensated by the success of its work.

Astolphe de Custine dies the September 25th 1857 and is buried in Saint-Aubin of Auquainville, close to Fervaques. Its family brings a lawsuit in nullity against the will by which it bequeaths its fortune to his friend Holy-Bores. This last dies a few months after Custine, the October 18th 1858 but obtained nevertheless win on a purely posthumous basis.

Works

Olivier , 1826
Aloys or the Monk of the mount Saint-Bernard , 1829
Memories and voyages, or letters writes at various times, during races in Switzerland, in Calabria, in England and Scotland , Paris, 1830
Béatrix Cenci , theater, 1833
Le Monde as it is , 1835
Spain under Ferdinand VII , 1838
Ethel , 1839
Lettres of Russia , 1839
Romuald or the Vocation , 1848
Lettres with the marquis barn (date of unknown publication), published in 1925 per Mr. de Luppé
Memories and portraits (date of unknown publication), published in 1956 per P. of Lacretelle

Quotations

“the women without charm are as the poets whom one does not read”.
“So much of men than one believes happy because one sees them only passing”.
“My fatherland, with me, is everywhere where I admire”.
“the evils of the body give the idea of death, the sorrows of the heart those of eternity”.
“architecture is the aspect of the nations”.

Bibiliography

A. Luppé, Astolphe de Custine , Monaco, Editions of the Rock, 1957
Anka Muhlstein, has Taste For Freedom: The life off Astolphe de Custine , New York, Helen Marx Books, 1999
Julien Frederic Tarn, the marquis de Custine or Misfortunes of exactitude , Paris, Beech, 1985

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