Constancy of Théis

Constancy Marie de Théis , born with Nantes the September 7th 1767 and dead the April 13rd 1845, by its marriage Pipelet de Leury , then countess (1803) then princess of Salm-Dyck (1816), is a poetess and French Woman of letters .

Biography

Exit of a family originating in Picardy, girl of Marie Alexandre de Théis (1738 - 1796), judge-Master of National Forestry Commission of the city and county of Nantes, Constance of Théis accepted an excellent education and was made known as of the eighteen years age by poems published in the Almanach of the Muses , in particular a lovesong entitled “Rosebud”, who had a durable success. Consequently, it did not cease, until its death, writing poems. Its tragedy interfered songs, Sapho (1794), on a music of Martini, obtained an enormous success. On the other hand Camille (1800), drama in worms, does not succeed.

It was called by Marie-Joseph Chénier, “the MUSE of the Reason”, and also called “Boileau of the women”. First allowed woman with the College, it there lute several praises in prose, in particular those of Sedaine (1797), of Gaviniès (1802) and of Lalande (1809). It published Poésies (1811, 1814, in-8; 1825, 2 vol. in-18) among which one notices Épîtres , in particular the “Epistle with the women” (1797), six “Epistles with Sophie” (1801) and the “Epistle on the spirit and the blindness of the century” (1828); a novel noticed and rented by Beyle like a “small jewel”: Twenty-four hours of the life of a sensitive woman (1824, in-8); a collection of Thought (Aachen, 1829, in-12; rééd. by Pongerville, 1846, in-8).

She married in 1789 a surgeon rich and distinguished from the name of Pipelet de Leury, and is established in Paris. She left the capital under Terror in 1793, during approximately a year, which she made profitable to study mathematics. Towards 1800, Stendhal evokes it in the Vie of Henri Brulard , after being led by his/her cousin Pierre Daru to a meeting of a company of poetry that Constance Pipelet chaired: “It was seven hours and half evening and the room was extremely illuminated. Poetry made me horror. What a difference with Arioste and Voltaire! That was middle-class and flat (Which good school I had already!), but I admired with desire the throat of Mrs. Constance Pipelet which lute a piece of poetry. I said since it to him; it was then the woman of a poor devil of hernial surgeon and I spoke to him at Mrs. the Beugnot countess when it was princess of Salm-Dyck, I believe. I will tell his marriage, preceded by two months by stay in prince de Salm with his lover, to see whether the castle would not displease to him too much; and the prince by no means misled, but knowing all and subjecting themselves to it, and it was right. ”

In 1802, the Pipelet husbands divorced and the following year, Constance married Joseph de Salm-Reifferscheidt-Dyck, count de Salm-Dyck and of the Holy roman Empire until the peace of Lunéville, and made prince de Salm by the king de Prusse in 1816.

The count and the countess of Salm-Dyck settled in 1809 in the hotel of Ségur, 97 Rue of the Vat. They made decorate the apartment with the first stage (anteroom, living room, library) in style Empire (v. 1810) by the architect Antoine Laurent Vaudoyer and the painter Jean-Jacques Lagrenée. The countess held until in 1824 to with it a literary Salon very shining. She was dependant with her cousin Paul-Louis Courier, who had dedicated to him in 1803 its first work, a Éloge of Helene , translated Isocrate. She also received Alexandre Dumas, Fayette, Talma, Jussieu, Alexander von Humboldt, of the artists like Girodet, Grétry, Houdon, Pajou, Pierre-Narcisse Guerin, Carle Vernet, etc Très mixed, her living room was opened with the Idéologues as with the liberals of the philosophical Decade , the Saint-Germain suburb crossed the nobility of Empire there, and much of freemasons of the “cabin of the Last nine Sisters” found themselves there.

Its portrait is today with the Art Institute off Chicago. Its tomb is with the Cimetière of the Father-Lachaise in Paris (26e division, Monvoisin way).

Works

Sapho , opera, music of Jean Paul the Aegis Martini, Paris, Theater-Louvois, December 14th 1794.
Epistle with the women , 1797.
Report/ratio on the artificial flowers Russet-red-Montagnac citizens , 1798.
Camille, or Friendship and imprudence , drama in 5 acts, worms, Paris, Th3e4atre Fran1cais, 1800.
Report/ratio on a work of the Théremin Citizen, entitled: Condition of the women in a republic , 1800.
Epistle with a young author on independence and duties of the man of letters , 1806.
Precise of the life of Sapho , 1810.
Poetries , 1811, in-8.
Poetries , 1814, in-8.
Twenty-four hours of the life of a sensitive woman , novel, 1824, in-8. ; rééd. in 2007 with the Editions Phébus (ISBN-10: 2752902484)
Poetries , 1825, 2 vol. in-18.
Fragment of a work on Germany , 1826.
Thought , Aachen, 1829, in-12; rééd. by Jean-Baptiste Sanson de Pongerville, 1846, in-8.
My Sixty years , Paris, Didot, 1833.
Works , Paris, Didot, 1835.
complete Works , Paris, 1842, 4 vol. in-8.

Quotations

“We like morals when we are old, because it makes us a merit of a crowd of deprivations which became to us a need. ” ( Thought )

“the conversation of the women, in the company, resembles this sleeping bag of which one is used for oneself to pack the porcelains: it is nothing, and without him all breaks. ” ( Thought )

Which is this thus that the rhyme? A light chain

That the spirit is essential, that the school exaggerates;

a charm with measurement added learnedly,

But which should not obstruct art nor the feeling. (1812)

References

External bonds

Note on Constancy of Salm

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