HAPPY 200th BIRTHDAY, Alexandre Dumas fils: Comment on The Lady of the Camellias
July 27, 2024 commemoration/celebration
HAPPY 200th BIRTHDAY, Alexandre Dumas fils!!!
WOW!!! I am SO IMPRESSED!!! Some of the readers didn’t just finish The Lady of the Camellias - BUT THEY EVEN READ MANON LESCAUT!!! Congratulations!!!
Comment on the image below:
The Burial of Manon Lescaut (1878), by Pascal
Dagnan-Bouveret (1852-1929). The scandalous novel about the tragic love of Chevalier des Grieux and Manon Lescaut was written by Antoine François Prévost, known as Abbé Prévost (1697-1763), a French priest and writer. Published in 1731, Manon Lescaut is the most reprinted French novel in history. Since Alexandre Dumas gives away the ending - this painting is its illustration - the devastated des Grieux digging the grave of the great love of his life, the courtesan Manon Lescaut… A fact from Anna’s life - Manon Lescaut was the first theatre play I’ve even seen, in my teens, it most definitely made an impression… Since this year just happens to be the 100th anniversary of the death of Giacomo Puccini (1858-1924), I can’t recommend listening to his 1893 opera Manon
Lescaut enough!!! Another commemoration!!!
The first few chapters of The Lady of the Camellias are quite revelatory about the world of prostitutes and courtesans - a timely transition to our reading of Dostoevsky’s Notes from Underground and Crime and Punishment - both featuring prostitutes as main characters - Lisa and Sonya…
Dumas fils makes a reference to his illustrious literary predecessors who wrote about prostitutes - including his father!!! Note on Victor Hugo’s play “Marion Delorme” - the French courtesan who inspired the play, Marion Delorme (1613-1650), was d’Artagnan’s contemporary and the fictional Milady’s neighbour at today’s Place des Vosges - Place Royale in the 17th century!!!
“Hugo has written Marion Delorme, Musset has written Bernerette, Alexandre Dumas has written Fernande, the thinkers and poets of all time have brought to the courtesan the offering of their pity, and at times a great man has rehabilitated them with his love and even with his name. If I insist on this point, it is because many among those who have begun to read me will be ready to throw down a book in which they will fear to find an apology for vice and prostitution; and the author’s age will do something, no doubt, to increase this fear. Let me undeceive those who think thus, and let them go on reading, if nothing but such a fear hinders them.”
Alexandre Dumas fils, The Lady of the Camellias, from Chapter 3.
