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Biography

Childhood and marriage

the Viscount François-Rene de Chateaubriand is resulting from a very old ruined aristocratic family of Saint-Malo, which found its dignity of antan thanks to the commercial success of the father of Chateaubriant, Rene-Auguste. This commercial success was based on the trade with the colonies (and thus most probably on the triangular trade). The François-Rene young person initially had to live distant from his parents, with a teacher. But the three years age the success of his/her father made it possible this last to repurchase in 1771 the Château of Combourg in Brittany, in which Chateaubriand settled and passed an often morose childhood.

It made rapids studies with the colleges of Fraud-of-Brittany and from Rennes, obtains a patent of second lieutenant to the Régiment of Navarre at 17 years, was made captain at 19 years. It came to Paris in 1788, where it bound with Jean-François of the Toothing-stone, Marie-Joseph Chénier, Jean-Pierre Louis de Fontanes and other literary men of the time, and made its literary beginnings by writing worms for the Almanach of the Muses. It then is nourished of Corneille and is marked by Rousseau.

It Maria in 1792 with Celestial of the Vine-Bush, downward of a family of the minor nobility of Brittany, she was 17 years old, they did not have a posterity. He forsook it all his life to carry out a life brilliant and agitated, it was however faithful for him and was shown of an admirable devotion at the end of their common life which was completed for Chateaubriand eighteen months after the death of his wife.

Exiled

To the French revolution, it moved away from France to the sight of popular excesses, and embarked for the Nouveau World. He traversed during one year the forests of the North America, alive with the autochtones and outlining on the spot his poem of the Natchez . He will find in these landscapes the reflection of his feeling of exile and loneliness.

He returned from America in 1792, to go to join with Coblentz the army of the emigrants; its Céleste young woman is stopped like " woman of émigré" , imprisoned in Rennes where it will remain until Thermidor 9. Wounded to the Head office of Thionville, it is transported convalescent with Jersey. It will be the end of its military career.

Celestial lives in Brittany, forsaken by his/her husband who did not give him a news and which will live with London, in 1793, in a destitution which reduced it to give French lessons and to make translations for the booksellers. It is in this city that it published in 1797 its first work, the Test on the old and modern revolutions in their relationship with the French revolution , where it expressed political ideas and nuns little harmonizes some with those which it will profess later, but where already its talent of writer appeared.

Return in France and the first successes literary

It is a letter of his/her dying mother who will bring back it to the religion. Of return in France in 1800, it directed during a few years the Mercure de France with Jean-Pierre Louis de Fontanes, and made appear in this review, in 1801, Atala , creation original which excited a universal admiration.

It composed about the same time Rene , work impressed of a rêveuse melancholy, which will become a model for the romantic writers . In this work, it brings back so as to disguised sorrow the love pure but violent one and impassioned whom it maintained for his Lucile sister, who called it “the enchanter”. His Céleste wife lived then with Lucile in their castle of Brittany, but they had ceased speaking about Rene, them great man which they liked.

It published then the April 14th 1802 the Génie of the Christianity , which it had partly written in England, and whose Atala and Rene was in the beginning only episodes: he had proposed to show there that the Christianisme, quite higher than the Paganisme by the purity of its morals, was not less favorable to art and poetry only the “fictions” of Antiquity. This book made event and gave the signal of a return of the monk after the Revolution.

Chateaubriant, noticed by the First Consul Napoleon Bonaparte, was selected in 1803 to accompany the cardinal Fesch with Rome as embassy secretary. At this point in time Rene reappears with the castle, just twenty-four hours, to invite his Céleste wife to accompany it in Rome. This one, learning its connection with the countess from Beaumont, refuses the eternal triangle.

He had just been charged in 1804 to represent France close to the République with Were worth when he knew the execution of the duke of Enghien: he gave his resignation immediately and passed then in the opposition to the Empire.

The voyage in the East

Returned with the Letters, Chateaubriand conceived the project of a Christian epopee, where would be put in presence the expiring Paganisme and the incipient religion; he wanted to visit by itself the places where was to be located the action, and to this end traversed the Greece, the Asia Mineure, the Palestine and the Egypt during the year 1806.

On its return of the East, exiled by Napoleon with three miles of the capital, it acquires the Valley-with-Wolves, in the Valley of Aulnay (currently in the commune of Châtenay-Malabry), close to Sceaux, where it went to be locked up in a modest retirement; his Céleste wife joined there, it tells in her Souvenirs , with humor, conditons them picturesque of installation. Chateaubriant composed there the Martyrs , kind of epopee in prose, which appeared only in 1809.

The notes which the author had collected during his voyage formed the matter of the Route from Paris to Jerusalem (1811). The same year, Chateaubriand was elected member of the French Academy, in the place of Marie-Joseph Chénier; but having, in its project of speech of reception, severely blamed certain acts of the Revolution, it was not allowed to him to take possession of its seat; it could sit only after the Restauration.

Favor and disgrace

Chateaubriant accommodated with transport the return of the Bourbon S. As of on March 30th 1814, it had published against the deposed emperor virulent a Pamphlet, De Buonaparte and Bourbons , which was widespread to thousands of specimens, and which, with the dires of Louis XVIII, was worth with this prince an army. His wife had found to engage at her sides in Ghent during the Hundred Days, in Paris at the time of the return of the Bourbons. With an unexpected direction of the policy with which it mixes a natural good sense, Céleste had become the confidante of Chateaubriant and even her inspirer. During all the Restoration, she played near him a part of listened adviser. Chateaubriant had accompanied Louis XVIII with Ghent and it became one of the members of its cabinet, it addressed to him celebrates it Rapport on the state of France . Appointed ambassador in Sweden, it had not left Paris yet when Napoleon i returned to France in 1815.

After the defeat of the Emperor, it was named Minister of state and Pair of France; but, in Monarchy according to the Charter , having attacked the ordinance of September 5th 1816 which dissolved the untraceable Chambre, it was disgraced and lost its post of minister of State. It was thrown consequently in the ultraroyalist opposition and became one of the principal writers of the Conservateur, the most powerful body of this party.

The murder of the duke of Berry, in 1820, brought it closer to the court: he wrote on this occasion Mémoires on the life and the death of the duke . He is named the same year minister of France with Berlin, then ambassador in England in 1822 (where its cook invents the cooking of the ox part which bears its name).

He was one of the Plénipotentiaire S with the Congrès of Vérone, and made decide the invasion of revolutionary Spain, in spite of the opposition of England. On its return, it accepted the wallet of Foreign Minister; it will make a success of the Spanish adventure with the catch of Cadiz to the Bataille of Trocadéro in 1823; but, not having been able to agree with Mr. of Villèle, chief of the cabinet, he saw himself brutally congédié on June 5th 1824.

He returned at once in the opposition, but to link itself this time at the Liberal party, and fought with excess the Villèle ministry, either with the Chambre of the Pars, or in the Journal of DEBATEs where he gave the signal of the defection: he at that time showed the knight defender of the Freedom of the press and the independence of Greece, which was worth a great popularity to him.

With the fall of Mr. de Villèle, it was named ambassador with Rome (1828), where Céleste accompanied it this time and where it held its row of ambassadress with brilliance. But it gave its resignation to the advent of the ministry Polignac, it was its political decline.

The abandonment of the political career

More and more in rupture with the conservative parties, disillusioned on the future of monarchy, it withdrew businesses after the Révolution of 1830, leaving even the Room of the Pars. It announced more its existence political only by sour criticisms against the new government ( Of the Restoration and the Elective monarchy , 1831), by voyages near the déchue family, and by the publication of a Mémoire on the captivity of the duchess of Berry (1833), memory on the subject of which it was continued, but discharged. It also published in 1831 historical Études (4 vol. in-8), summarized universal history where it wanted to show Christianity reforming the company; this work was to be the frontispiece of a French history which he contemplated for a long time, but that he did not carry out. Its last years had passed in a deep retirement, in company of Celestial his wife; it hardly left its residence that to go to the Abbey-with-Wood, at Juliette Récamier, of which he was the constant friend and whose living room joined together the elite of the literary world. At the house, he does not listen to any more Céleste. During some time it had taken account of its political and literary observations, noted what she said until signing of the sentences which were of her, so much so that one could have spoken about collaboration between them. But Mrs Récamier had quickly required her attention, it played the confidants with attentive listening, the foot of her couch. He forgot from now on to consult his wife.

He had begun as of 1811 memories on his own life; he took them again and almost continued them until its last moments. Receiving many visits, as well of the romantic youth than of liberal youth, it was thus devoted to complete its memories, as it entitled Mémoires of in addition to-fall , autobiographical vast project spread out over thirty years. These Mémoires was to appear only after its death; however, pressed by needs for money, which besieged it all its life, it yielded them as of 1836 to a company which ensured to him a suitable income for the remainder of its days.

He died in 1848 with Paris; Celestial had accompanied it until the end. During the eighteen months that he survived Céleste, he will make a late statement and perhaps a hypocritical bit: " I owe tender and eternal recognition with my wife whose attachment was as touching as deep and sincere. It made my life more serious, nobler, more honourable, by always inspiring the respect, if not always the force of the duties to me. ".

Its remainders were transported to Saint-Malo and were deposited vis-a-vis the sea, according to its wish, on the rock of the Grand Be, small island of romantic aspect located in the roads of its birthplace, which one reaches in foot from Saint-Malo when the sea was withdrawn.

Chateaubriant and Napoleon Bonaparte

The two men nourished a complex relation, even paradoxical, print of mutual fascination and hatred. Chateaubriant thus envied the epic dimension of the life of Napoleon.

Work analyzes

By its talent as by its excesses, Chateaubriand can be regarded as the father of the Romantisme in France. Its descriptions of nature and its analysis of the feelings of the me thus made of it a model for the generation of the romantic writers. It has, the first, formulated the “wave of passions” which will become a commonplace of the romanticism:

“One lives, with a full heart in an empty world; and without to have used of nothing, one is disillusioned of all.” ( Genius of Christianity , 1802)

Its thought and its political action seem to offer many contradictions; he wanted to be to be at the same time the friend of the legitimate royalty and freedom, alternatively defending that of both which seemed to him to be in danger:

“I am, has it says itself, bourbonien by honor, monarchist by reason, republican by taste and character. ”

Its detractors reproached him a bombastic style and an excessive vanity which would burst in its Mémoires of in addition to-falls .

One observes in his Mémoires of in addition to-fall a duality between the personal Chateaubriant which exalte its feelings with a romantic Lyrisme and the public Chateaubriant which establishes a chronicle of memorialist of its time, which saw the advent of the Démocratie to which he was opposed. It is noticed that throughout his work the two characters gather in only one, they join thus and it is noticed that all the political life of Chateaubriant was influenced by its personal feelings and its loneliness which was transformed into a paranoia and a fear against a possible plot that he believed formulated against him since he was distant on several occasions from the monarchical capacity.

Quotations on Chateaubriant

Victor Hugo would have exclaimed, being child: “I want to be Chateaubriand or nothing! ”.
Talleyrand said Chateaubriant: “Mister de Chateaubriand believes that it becomes deaf because it does not hear more of him”.

Art

Portrait of Chateaubriant and Atala with the tomb by the painter Girodet (Versailles & Louvre)
Statue out of marble by the sculptor Francisque Duret (museum of Versailles)
Statue bronzes of it by the sculptor Aimé Millet (Holy Malo)
Buste & medallion by the sculptor David of Angers
Portrait of Chateaubriant on bottom of mountainous landscape, by the painter Pierre-Narcisse Guerin
Portrait of Chateaubriant by the painter sculptor Antoine Etex
Lithographie of Chateaubriant & Pauline De Beaumont by the painter Felix Philippoteaux
Statue places town of Combourg and portrait with the castle of Combourg
the Combourg price for the writers
Stamps with the portrait of Chateaubriant…

Works

historical, political and moral Test on the old and modern revolutions, considered in their relationship with the French revolution (1797)
Atala (1801)
Rene (1802)
Genius of Christianity (1802)
the Martyrs (1809)
Memories of my life (1809)
Route from Paris to Jerusalem (1811)
De Buonaparte and of the Bourbons (1814)
Natchez (1826)
Voyage in America (1827)
historical Études on the fall of the Roman Empire (1831)
Essai on the English literature (1836)
the Congress of Vérone (1838)
the Life of Rancid (1844)
Mémoires of in addition to-falls , posthumous (1848). the Memories of in addition to-fall , initially published in the serial of the Press , were published in 12 vol. in-8 1849 to 1850.

; Old publications

In addition to many editions of each separate work of Chateaubriant, it was made several editions of its complete Œuvres , whose that of Pierre-François Ladvocat, in 31 volumes in-8, Paris, 1826-1831, re-examined by the author even, who joined critical explanations and notes there, and enriched it by some new works (the Abencerrages , the Natchez , Moïse , tragedy, of various poetries, the political discourses); and that of Charles Gosselin, 25 volumes in-8, 1836 - 1838, also containing the Congress of Vérone , a Test on the English literature , a translation of the Paradise lost of John Milton.

Biographies and studies

; Old biographies

Paul de Noailles, his successor with the Academy, made there its Éloge
Scipion Marin and Jacques-François Ancelot wrote his Vie
François-Zénon de Collombet: Chateaubriant, its life and its writings
Holy-Beuve: Chateaubriant and its literary group
Charles Benoît: Study on Chateaubriant

; Modern biographies

Jean d' Ormesson, Album Chateaubriant , Library of the Pleiad, Gallimard, 1988
Ghislain de Diesbach, Chateaubriant , 1995
Jean-Paul Clement, Chateaubriant , Great biographies, Flammarion, 1998
Andre Maurois, Rene or life of Chateaubriant , Books Red, Grasset, October 2005

; Studies

Manual of Diéguez: Chateaubriant or the poet vis-a-vis the history, Plon, Paris, 1963.

Celestial Armand of Chateaubriant
of Chateaubriant

Resources Internet

complete Works
: Mémoires of in addition to-falls , Volume I; Correspondence of Chateaubriant with the marchioness of V… a last love of Rene .
'' Pensées, reflections and maxims ''

External bonds

a biography, summaries and studies
video Document: Chateaubriant, untamed the , talks carried out by Jacques Pasquet.
Bibliographic record of the Large universal Dictionary of Pierre Larousse and bonds suggested by the university of Rouen.
Genealogy of the Chateaubriant family, notes biographical and bibliographical
Works of Chateaubriant in numerical reading
Site of the House of Chateaubriant
Chateaubriant out of Holy Land
handwritten Letter of Chateaubriant

Partial source

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