Alexandre Dumas

gigatos | March 16, 2022

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Summary

Alexandre Dumas, born as Dumas Davy de la Pailleterie (born July 24, 1802, died December 5, 1870) was a French novelist and playwright, author of The Count of Monte Christo and The Three Musketeers.

His father was General Thomas Alexandre Dumas (d. 1806). From the age of sixteen he worked as a chancellor. In 1829 he achieved considerable success with the historical drama Henry III and His Court. In the following years he triumphed on the stage with such works as Antony (1831), The Tower of Nesle (1832), Kean (1836) and The Maid of Belle-Isle (1839).

His greatest fame came with the historical and adventure novels he wrote in the 1840s: The Count of Monte Christo (1845), a cycle about musketeers: The Three Musketeers (1844), Twenty Years Later (1845), Viscount de Bragelonne (1848). Also very popular were: a series about the Valois family: Queen Margot (1845), Madame de Monsoreau (1846), and The Forty-Five (1847-1848), and the series Memoirs of a Physician: Joseph Balsamo (1847-1848), The Queen”s Necklace (1849-1850), The Angel of Pitou (1851), The Countess de Charny (1852-1855), and The Chevalier de Maison-Rouge (1845-1846). He left behind more than two hundred works.

His love novels (omnes fabulae amatoriae) were all placed in the index librorum prohibitorum by decree of 1863.

Early years

Alexander Dumas was born on July 24, 1802, in Villers-Cotterêts, in a house on Lormelet Street. His father was the son of the Marquis de la Pailleterie and a black slave, Cessette Dumas, born in San Domingo. He earned the rank of general in the army of revolutionary France. In 1792 he married Marie Louise Labouret, daughter of an innkeeper from Villers-Cotterêts. In the Italian campaign he distinguished himself by his bravery. During the Egyptian campaign he was in conflict with the commander-in-chief, Napoleon Bonaparte. During his lonely return to France he was imprisoned in Naples. After two years seriously ill, he returned to his wife. Because of Napoleon”s disfavor, the general”s family lived in poverty for the rest of his life. The writer”s father died in 1806. The general”s widow, having received a license to run a trafique, opened a small store in Villers-Cotterêts.

Little Dumas was not eager to learn, and in his childhood he learned only reading and calligraphy, for which he felt drawn, as well as horseback riding and fencing. He spent most of his time in the woods surrounding his hometown.

At the age of sixteen he took a job as a law clerk with a notary, Mr. Mennesson. He spent his leisure time riding horses and making love. At Villers he fell in love for the first time, with Adela Dalwin. Influenced by a performance of Hamlet by a travelling troupe from Soissons, he founded a local theater with his friend Adolphe de Leuven, for which they wrote several plays between 1820 and 1822, including the most successful, a vaudeville with couplets by the Major of Strasbourg. Leuven later left for Paris, and Adela married.

Also read, biographies – Henry II of France

First steps in Paris

Alone, Dumas set off in 1823, following his friend to the capital. Thanks to his father”s friend, General Foy, he got a job in the chancellery of the Duke of Orleans (the future King Louis Philippe). To his collaborator, Mr. Lassagne, he owed the first years of his stay in Paris to his acquaintance with the works of French and foreign classical literature. He was also a frequent and fond theatre-goer. During one of the performances, he met the critic Charles Nodier, who was to help him in his future theatrical debut. Together with Leuven, he staged a one-act vaudeville play, Hunting and Loving, in Ambigu, for which he earned 300 francs, the three months” salary he earned in his law office. He then went to live on the Place des Italiens with the seamstress Catherine Labay, who gave birth to his son Alexander on July 27, 1824. Thanks to the increase at the chancellery, he brought his mother to Paris and rented a separate apartment for her.

Influenced by the performance of English actors staging Shakespeare in Paris, he decided to take up a historical subject – the murder by order of Queen Christina of Sweden of Giovanni Mondaleschi in 1657. After writing the play, thanks to Nodier”s support, the play was accepted by the director of the French Theatre. Ultimately, however, it was prevented from being staged by the star of the local stage, Miss Mars. Soulié”s Christine was performed at the French Theater. Undeterred by the failure, Dumas wrote another historical drama in two months about the Duke de Guise”s punishment of his cheating wife, entitled Henry III and His Court. The play, which premiered on February 11, 1829, was a huge success and was performed 38 times. It became an important event in the war between the Romantics and the classics at the time.

Wanting his hands free, Dumas gave up his job as a law clerk and took out a loan of 3,000 francs, the equivalent of his two years” salary. The income from Henry III, published in book form, doubled that amount. After the success of Henry III, Dumas became the ornament of Nodier”s literary salon. Powerfully built, laden with jewels and trinkets, and a great raconteur, he attracted the attention of his guests, if a bit boastful. At one of the meetings he met the scholar Villaneve”s daughter, Melania Waldor, wife of an infantry captain stationed outside Paris. Dumas launched an assault on her heart. After three months, she succumbed. With the money he earned, Dumas then rented a cottage in Passy for Catherine Labay and his son, and an apartment on rue l”Université for himself and Melania.

At the request of Felix Harel, director of the Odeon theater, Dumas revised his Christina and the play was staged on March 30, 1830. Christine was no match for Henry III – it mixed literary types, and was also written in verse, which was not Dumas”s strong suit. However, at a reception after the premiere, friends Hugo and de Vigny made the necessary corrections and the second performance was received with enthusiasm. After the play, Dumas met Marie Dorval, his next lover.

In the months that followed, Dumas prevented Melania”s husband from coming to Paris, wrote her fiery letters, and simultaneously cheated on her with Marie Dorval, Louisa Despteux, and Virginia Bourbier. He was writing another Antony play at this time, a drama no longer historical but contemporary, in which he introduced a faithful wife to the stage, modeled on Melanie Waldor, a character who would establish herself on the stage of nineteenth-century theater for many decades. In May, Bella Krelsamer arrived in Paris and in the following months she would supplant not only his minor love affairs but also Melania Waldor.

Playwright

On hearing of the outbreak of the July Revolution Dumas donned the Republican dress. He fought on the barricades, and when the revolutionaries ran out of gunpowder, he went, with General La Fayette”s permission, to Soissons and brought the necessary supplies from there. He then tried to organize a national guard in the Vendée, but without success. He hoped to receive a ministerial portfolio for his services; when the king dispelled this, he returned to the theater. At the request of Harel and Miss George, he wrote Napoleon Bonaparte”s Odeon for the theater in a week. The play was not a success. Meanwhile, as a result of the lifting of censorship, the French Theatre began rehearsing Antony. Once again, Miss Mars, who did not like the play, led to the postponement of the play”s staging date and its marginalization on the eve of its premiere. Dumas withdrew the drama and donated it to the Porte-Saint-Martin theater. The leading female role was played by Marie Dorval. The play premiered on May 3, 1831 and was a stunning success. It was performed 130 times in Paris and for years in the provinces. Critics hailed the play as the fulfillment of the ideal of romantic love, and Dumas as the most outstanding playwright of his generation. French men carried themselves after Antony, and French women after Adela, the play”s main character.

At this time there were serious tensions in the writer”s private life. Bella Krelsamer gave birth to his daughter Maria Alexandra in March 1831. Melania Waldor made scenes of jealousy, wrote letters, harassed Bella, and finally calmed down – she was also a writer and poet, so she needed Dumas” help. Bella demanded that Dumas recognize her daughter, which also prompted the writer to take belated action for the recognition of his son Alexander. On March 17, he obtained a deed of recognition of his son, giving him parental authority over the boy. The mother, despite her struggle, had to give in. Young Alexander, however, resisted, did not recognize the right of his father”s mistress to direct his life, and Dumas, resigned, finally placed him in boarding school.

The writer”s next play, Charles VII at His Great Vassals, which premiered at the Odeon on October 20, 1831, was received rather coolly by the audience. The story of a woman who falls in love with a man who does not love her, and orders him to kill a man who is in love with her and whom she does not love, did not captivate the audience. In addition, the lead female role – written for the ethereal Maria Dorval – was played by the powerful Miss George. Meanwhile, Prosper Goubaux and Jacques Beudin brought Dumas a draft of the drama Richard Darlington, for which they could not find an ending. Dumas reworked the main character for Frederic Lemaitre, who excelled in the roles of cynical and ruthless protagonists, and finally disposed of Richard”s wife by throwing her out the window. The play was enthusiastically received by the audience.

It was still being performed and already Dumas had been sent a draft of a play by the melodrama maker Anicet Bourgeois entitled Thérèse. Dumas did not like the sketch, except for the supporting female part, for which Bocage suggested Ida Ferrier. Ida was very successful in the play, and Dumas was so impressed with the actress that she became his mistress. Bella Krelsamer was at the time on a provincial performance. Upon her return there was a brawl between the two women.

When Carnival came, Bocage persuaded Dumas to give a ball. Dumas rented a large apartment for the purpose, which was decorated by the best painters of the day. The most prominent writers, painters, actors, and political figures attended the ball, which attracted more than 400 guests. The next day, the press emphasized that no one in Paris would be able to give such a ball except Dumas.

Meanwhile, Harel submitted to the writer a play by Frederic Gaillardet, Portrait of Saint-Martin, revised by Julius Janin, but still unsuitable for staging. Dumas added an introduction, a scene in prison, cutting dialogue and highlighted the essence of the drama, which is the battle between the adventurer Buridan, armed with the power of his genius, and Queen Marguerite of Burgundy, equipped with the power of her position. The play, entitled The Tower of Nesle, premiered on May 29, 1832. The roles of the main protagonists were played by Miss Georges and Bocage. The success of the play was enormous.

Between 1832 and 1833, Dumas managed to divide his life between Bella and Ida. The first year he lived with one, the next he moved in with the other. The peaceful coexistence was facilitated by the fact that they were both actresses, and he lavished attention on both. In 1832, Dumas”s Angel had some success. Later that year the playwright, accused of taking part in a republican demonstration, went to Switzerland for several months out of caution. The fruits of his stay were two volumes of Travel Impressions, which were published in the Revue de Deux Mondes. During this time the writer also skilled himself in writing historical stories.

In 1833, Ida starred in Catherine Howard. The play damaged Victor Hugo”s Maria Tudor and the actress and mistress he promoted, Julia Drouet. In retaliation, Hugo”s journalist friend Granier de Cassagnac wrote a scathing attack on Dumas. The two men quarreled with each other. Some time later Dumas asked Hugo to be his second in a duel, thus settling the dispute.

In 1835 the writer went to Italy, from where he brought back three dramas, a translation of the Divine Comedy and another volume of Travel Impressions. In Lyon, on his way back, he seduced Jacinta Meynier without success. The year 1836 brought him another triumph: the drama Kean or Disorder and Genius, a work about a prominent English actor who had tragically died. The draft of the play, by Théaulon and Courcy, Frederic Lemaître, dissatisfied with the text, brought it to Dumas, who expanded the plot and changed the dialogue. The premiere took place at the Varieté theater. In 1836 Hugo and Dumas were awarded the Order of the Legion of Honor. From then on the writer was fond of parading adorned with numerous decorations, which he asked for or bought during his numerous travels.

On August 1, 1836, the artist”s mother died. After her death Dumas went to live permanently with Ida Ferrier, who watched his amorous affairs through her fingers. He, in turn, kept her royally, took her on all his travels, and in 1837 secured for her the position of first leading lady at the Comédie Française, in exchange for two plays written especially for that stage. Ida made her stage debut at this theater with a role in Dumas” Caligula, which, despite its complicated plot, received good reviews.

In the same year, already reconciled with each other, Hugo and Dumas made efforts to open a new theater in Paris, whose director they appointed Antenor Joly. On the stage of the new theater, called Rennaisance, Dumas staged The Alchemist in 1838, written in collaboration with Gerard de Nerval. The two authors had already written together the comedy Piquillo for Jenny Colon, with whom Nerval was in love, and simultaneously with The Alchemist they wrote Leo Burckart, which was eventually signed by Nerval himself. The leading role in The Alchemist was played by Ida Ferrier, whom Dumas married on February 1, 1840. According to anecdote, he did so at the express request of the Duke of Orleans. Melania Waldor violently protested against the marriage, and Bella Krelsamer filed a complaint with the court to give up her daughter.

Faced with the failure of his last dramas, Dumas decided to try his hand at comedy and in 1839 produced The Mme de Belle-Isle. The play, set in the 18th century, revolves around the bet of the Duc de Richelieu, conqueror of women”s hearts, that by evening he would become the lover of the first woman to enter the salon. The comedy was staged at the French Theater and met with favorable reviews from critics. Encouraged by its success, in 1841 the artist staged another comedy, Marriage in the Time of Louis XVI, a story of spouses who, having separated, recognize their mistake, abandon their lovers and reunite. His next comedy, The Maids de Saint-Cyr, was not as successful. Encouraged by the nomination of Victor Hugo, Dumas tried at this time, unsuccessfully, for admission to the French Academy.

At this time his son, Alexander, went to live with Dumas. He took part for a time in his swaggering and disorderly life, and finally, unable to bear Mrs. Dumas, left for Marseilles. Meanwhile, the Dumas marriage had broken down. Ida, who had betrayed Dumas soon after their marriage, some time later seduced Edoardo Alliato, Duke of Villafranca, in Florence and from 1840 spent several months a year with him. In 1844 the Dumases decided to separate.

Novelist

The renaissance of the historical novel initiated by Walter Scott and the demand for this type of literature in France after the fall of Napoleon, during whose reign the French people came into personal contact with great history, pushed French writers towards the historical novel. Dumas, who was neither erudite nor a scholar, took up the historical novel through his collaborators. A friend of Nerval”s with whom Dumas had collaborated in the late 1830s-August Maquet-brought him a play which, after Dumas”s revisions, was produced in 1839 as Bathilda, under Maquet”s name. A year later, Maquet brought Dumas a draft of the novel Buvat, the story of the conspiracy of the Spanish ambassador Cellamare, who was expelled from France for plotting against the regent, seen through the eyes of a humble copyist with little understanding of the events taking place.

Two daily newspapers in France created the demand for the novel: La Presse and Le Siécle, which were sustained by subscriptions. The best way to keep subscribers was the novel in episodes. Dumas had already published the novel Captain Paul in Le Siécle in 1838, which gave the newspaper 5,000 subscribers. A draft brought by Maquet, after Dumas”s alterations, was submitted to Le Siécle in 1842 under the title Chevalier d”Harmental. Dumas wanted both he and Maquet to be listed as authors. However, the editors replied that they paid 3 francs per line for Dumas”s name and 30 su for both names, ten times less. Eventually, therefore, the novel was published under Dumas”s name. Its success was enormous and pushed the two authors to further attempts at novels.

There is no consensus as to who was first, Maquet or Dumas, to discover “Memoirs of Monsieur d”Artagnan, Captain-Lieutenant of His Majesty”s First Company of Musketeers,” an apocryphal work by Gatien de Courtilz, published in Cologne in 1700. Undoubtedly, however, numerous episodes of the novel, as well as the names – slightly altered – were borrowed from Courtilz. Maquet and Dumas added episodes with Madame Bonacieux and Milady de Winter. Maquet worked on the novel”s brief as usual: he queried historical sources and took care of the historical background of the events described. Dumas added thousands of details to enliven the text, added dialogue, worked out chapter endings and stretched them to fit the press. He also introduced new characters, including the taciturn Grimaud, for whose brief remarks he received the most effective rhymes until the newspaper introduced a rule that a line must exceed the width of half a column. The book was a remarkable success. Dumas turned the unsympathetic adventurers of Courtilz”s diary into legendary figures, “the living spirit of France.”

Dumas treated historical facts without ceremony. Whenever it was necessary to give a vivid scene he wrote it like a stage for the theater. He skillfully dosed the effects of surprise, horror, and comedy. His characters – costumed, colorful, somewhat caricatured – gave the illusion of life. He portrayed historical figures in a biased manner, loving his characters or hating them.

The Three Musketeers was published in 1844. The following year Dumas published a sequel to The Three Musketeers, Twenty Years Later, based on the events of the Fronde and the English Revolution. In the same year, 1845, Dumas began another trilogy, this time set during the reign of the last of the Valois, the novel Queen Margot, about the battle between Catherine of Medici and Henry of Navarre. The same year saw the publication of The Chevalier de la Maison-Rouge, a love story set around the events of the French Revolution.

Dumas”s success spawned a wave of criticism. Loménie accused him of industrialism. Mirecourt wrote a pamphlet: The Novel Factory. The Company of Alexander Dumas and Company, in which he exposed the real authors of Dumas”s plays and novels, rudely attacking the author and his family.

After Ida moved out, father and son moved in together again. In 1846, they took a trip to Spain Algeria. At the time, the government was looking for a way to get the French interested in their North African colony. Someone advised the minister of education to finance Dumas” trip to Algeria and to oblige him to write a memoir of the trip upon his return.

Dumas was at the height of his career. Governments treated him like a lord. His novels were selling brilliantly. In 1846 he published the continuation of the Valois trilogy: “Madame de Monsoreau” – an engrossing chronicle of the reign of Henry III, and Joseph Balsamo initiating another cycle, entitled Memoirs of a Physician, describing the twilight and decline of the French monarchy in the eighteenth century. He also adapted his novels for the stage. The Musketeers, staged in Ambigu and lasting from seven in the evening until one in the morning, drew crowds, and the drama did not include a single love scene.

Monte Christo

In 1842, while traveling in Italy, Dumas saw a small island called Monte Christo. The name delighted him. The following year, he signed a contract for eight volumes entitled Impressions of a Tour of Paris. After the success of Secrets of Paris, publishers insisted that it be an adventure novel. Dumas turned to the Memoirs extracted from the archives of Parisian police officer Jacques Peuchet for the chapter telling the fate of Parisian shoemaker Picaud. Denounced by envious rivals just days before his wedding, he is sent to prison, from which he emerges after seven years and, under assumed identities, kills his three abusers, then dies himself.

The theme was as if created for Dumas. His hero took revenge by exacting justice. Dumas carried in his heart secret resentments against society in general and against a few enemies in particular. His father was a victim of Napoleon; he himself was solicited by creditors and scribes. Influenced by a conversation with Maquet, the writer decided to develop the first parts of the novel giving these parts the titles: Marseilles and Rome. His Dantès would be an unrelenting avenger, but he would not be a feral murderer. In an effort to lighten the darkness of the novel, Dumas added to the main character an eastern lover, Haydée, with whom he sails off into the distance at the end of the novel, having first associated the marriage of a friend”s son.

The success of the novel, published between 1845 and 1846, exceeded all expectations. Dumas, who had never been able to separate life from novelistic fiction, felt like a nabob himself and embarked on a plan to build the Chateau de Monte Christo. Back in 1843, he rented the Villa Medici in Saint-Germain-en-Laye and opened a theater there. He brought in actors, kept and fed them, and guaranteed their wages, drowning his fortune in this venture for fun. After the success of The Count of Monte Christo, he bought a piece of forest in Bongival, on the road to Saint-Germain. The forest was transformed into an English park. Two pavilions for servants in the style of Walter Scott stood at the wrought iron gate. In the middle of the park a “castle” was erected – a four-story mansion surrounded by a frieze of carved heads of geniuses from Homer to Dumas. Above the porch, the artist had the motto: “I love the one who loves me.” A minaret rose from the façade. The first floor was occupied by a salon in the style of Louis XIV, the next floors were rooms for guests. Two hundred meters from the castle a miniature Gothic tower was built. The whole project cost the writer about 500 thousand francs. Dumas invited 600 friends to the opening of his new residence on July 25, 1848.

Dumas himself occupied a small room in the castle with an iron bed and a wooden table, at which he worked from morning to evening. He continued to write and publish a great deal during these years: Two Diana (Forty-five (1847-1848), the last part of a trilogy set during the Valois dynasty, in which Diana de Monsoreau avenges the death of her lover on the Duke of Anjou; the Viscount de Bragelonne (1848-1850), the third part of a cycle about musketeers based on the Memoirs of the Duchess of La Fayette. In addition, he received anyone who came along. Guests living in the “chateau,” whom he often did not even know, cost him several hundred thousand francs a year. Women were now changing very quickly: first Louis Beaudoin, then Celesta Scrivaneck – the “Sultana of 1848”.

On February 21, 1847, Dumas opened his own theater, which he called the Historic Theater. The theater”s inaugural performance of Queen Margot lasted nine hours. A crowd of ten thousand onlookers gathered in front of the building on the day of the premiere. The Prince de Montpensier honored the premiere with his presence. The role of the queen mother was played by Beatrice Person, the writer”s favorite at the time. After Queen Margot Dumas staged Hamlet, with his own happy ending. The Historical Theatre”s first season brought in 707,905 francs in revenue. The second began with the success of the Chevalier de Maison Rouge. On February 7, 1848, the theater introduced a novelty, a play performed over two evenings: Monte Christo. This play, too, had excellent attendance until February 24, the day the Revolution of 1848 broke out.

Also read, history – Sack of Rome (1527)

Exile

The halls of the theaters were deserted. Dumas tried to take up politics. He ran unsuccessfully for election to the Chamber of Deputies from the department of Yonne. The box office of the Historical Theater shone empty, while the writer ordered more plays and engaged new actors. Monte Christo”s residence was seized for debts of over 230,000 francs. Ida Ferrier also sued for the return of a dowry of 100,000 francs. The tribunal declared the separation of the matrimonial property and obliged Dumas to return the dowry of 120,000 francs and to pay alimony of 6,000 francs a year. In an effort to save his estate, Dumas put it up for fictitious sale. The writer, though ruined, was still very generous. He supported unemployed actors. He organized Maria Dorval”s funeral with all her medals and decorations pawned. He published a pamphlet in tribute to the actress: The Last Year of Marie Dorval. Early in 1849, he staged Three Anthems to Molière”s “Love the Physician.” The play was booed by the audience. He continued to write quite a bit. In 1849 he published the second part of the series Memoirs of a Physician, entitled The Queen”s Necklace; in 1850, The Black Tulip; and in 1851, The Angel of Pitou, the third part of Memoirs of a Physician.

In 1851, after the political upheaval and the seizure of power by Napoleon III, Dumas and other writers went into exile in Belgium. Probably also to escape his creditors. Since he was not himself a political exile, he appeared briefly in Paris from time to time, where he left his current choice of heart, Isabella Constant, known as “Zirzabella.” In January 1852, the furnishings of his Paris apartment were sold to cover the bailiwick. On January 20, the writer was declared bankrupt. Although the debts of the Historical Theatre were separated from his personal debts, the liabilities amounted to 107,215 francs. The list of creditors announced in April 1853 included 153 people.

In Brussels Dumas, though without capital, rented two houses, had the inner walls thrown out, and created for himself a beautiful palace with an entrance gate and balcony. As his secretary he hired the exile Noël Parfait, who took his principal”s business into his own hands and also took on the task of transcribing novels, memoirs, and comedies that Dumas produced at such a rate that professional copyists could not keep up with him. To save himself time, Dumas did not use punctuation marks.

Parfait enforced the old dues. Thanks to the new intendant Dumas”s situation improved: he could lead a lavish life and treat the exiles to dinner. At this time the writer was planning to write a series of novels from the time of Jesus to the present day. His personal situation was further complicated by his adventures with women. He brought his daughter Maria to Belgium, in whom he wanted to have an assistant for the amorous maneuvers between Mrs. Guidi, Person, and Constant. Maria, however, either could not or did not want to hide her father”s instability, exposing the writer to numerous misunderstandings.

He printed his novels (including another volume of Memoirs of a Physician: Countess de Charny), some in Paris, others in Brussels. He staged plays under an assumed name in order to receive royalties for them. On April 1, 1852, Benvenuto Cellini, adapted from the novel Ascanio, was staged. The leading role in it was played by Isabella Constant. In Brussels Dumas also began to write his memoirs.

Musketeer

Returning to Paris, he established an evening journal, The Musketeer. In the first issue he announced the printing of 50 volumes of his memoirs. In addition to his diaries, which became the centerpiece of each issue, he also printed in the journal The Mohicans of Paris, The Companions of Yehuda, and a series of Great Men in Robes. Initially, the journal was so successful that influential publishers: Millaud and Villemessant offered Dumas to buy back the title. However, the writer refused. Soon the “Musketeer” collapsed. First the unpaid collaborators started to disappear, then the number of subscribers, tired of the uniformity of the offer, kept falling.

Dumas, to console himself, frequented a lot during this time. He was seen at the home of Princess Mathilde, a close cousin of Napoleon III, who from 1857 also took the writer”s son under her care. In 1857, Ida Ferrier died. In the same year, the writer”s daughter married.

In 1858 Dumas made a trip to Russia. In the same year, Maquet sued him for failure to meet financial obligations, but he lost. Dumas also reneged on other commitments – he promised to pay his daughter a dowry of 120,000 francs and failed to do so. In 1860 he received an advance of 120,000 francs, on account of the agreement made to publish all his works. He had the money used to build himself a two-master ship “Emma” in Marseilles and set off with his new lover Emilia Cordier on a journey to the East.

Revolutionary

Upon hearing of Garibaldi”s intended landing in Sicily, he joined the expedition and transported some of the revolutionary troops to the island. After the victory in Sicily, Garibaldi intended to move on Naples. Since he was short of funds, Dumas mortgaged his yacht and donated all the money at his disposal to the revolutionaries. On September 7, 1860, wearing a red shirt, he entered Naples with Garibaldi. Taking part in the expulsion of the Neapolitan Bourbons, he was taking a kind of revenge on those who had imprisoned and crippled his father years before.

After the victory, Garibaldi appointed Dumas director of antiquities and assigned him the Chiatamone palace as his home. The writer founded the journal “Independence” and practically filled it himself, writing introductory articles, variety, news, long historical articles and, of course, the novel episode. Written during this time were: History of the Neapolitan Bourbons in 11 volumes, the novel La San Felice, the Memoirs of Garibaldi. Meanwhile, on December 24, 1860, Emilia gave birth to his daughter Micela in Paris. Having become involved in political feuds and disputes, Dumas lived to see a demonstration demanding that he leave Naples.

In October 1862, he engaged in a new project. He donated his yacht and the rest of his money to Prince Skanderberg, president of the Greek-Albanian junta, for an expedition against the Turks. Skanderberg turned out to be an impostor who had misappropriated Dumas” gift. Shortly thereafter, Garibaldi relinquished power in Naples and left the city. Dumas also did not remain in Naples and returned to Paris. He graduated from La San Felice and Garibaldi. Emilia demanded marriage, he was only willing to acknowledge their daughter.

Recent years

Returning to Paris, he took with him a singer, Fanny Gordosa. He settled first on Richelieu Street, and in 1864 rented the villa “Catinat” in Enghien. Fanny practiced vocalizations, surrounded by a crowd of bakers, while Dumas worked on the second floor. Numerous women passed through Enghien: Aimée Desclée, Blanche Pierson, Agar – actually Leonida Charvin, Esther Guimond, and Olympia Andouard. To Mathilde Schoebel Dumas explained that he had mistresses through humanitarianism, if he had one woman she would die before the week was out. Upon his return to Paris, he gave a lavish dinner every Thursday until Fanny caught him in flagranti with his mistress in the theater box and fled from him with the rest of his money. After Fanny left, he took in his daughters Maria and Micela.

In 1865, Dumas produced two dramas: The Mohicans of Paris and The Prisoner of the Bastille. At the same time he was printing one of his best novels, La San Felice, which is set in Naples in the early 19th century during the time of Maria Carolina, Lady Hamilton, and Nelson. The Paris Theater also revived The Foresters, one of the writer”s better plays, which had premiered in Marseilles, in 1858, at this time.

That same year, the publisher, Daniel Lévy, gave Dumas 40,000 francs in gold for an illustrated edition of his works, but even this money the writer quickly spent. It was said of him that he made his fortune ten times and went bankrupt eleven times. He himself said at the end of his life that he should have had a 200,000 franc annual annuity, but he was 200,000 in debt.

In 1866, he left Paris. He visited Naples, Florence, and Germany. He brought back from his trip a well-written novel, The Prussian Terror, in which he warned against German resentments. But the needs of the public were different, and no one wanted to take the old writer”s warnings seriously.

His debts grew steadily, and most of his furniture was sold to pay for them. In 1867, he met Ada Menken, a young American voltaire of Jewish descent, who had performed successfully in Europe in Mazeppa and Pirates of the Savannah. The two flaunted their mutual love, seeking publicity. Dumas posed with his lover for photographs, which the photographer put up for public sale in exchange for debts. This resulted in a series of attacks on the writer in the press. Dumas, however, was crazy about his American woman, disregarding the unpleasantness.

Trying to save his finances and find the means to pamper his new chosen one, Dumas founded the magazine “D”Artagnan”, which after a short time collapsed. In 1868 he went to Le Havre to give lectures. There he met with his daughter Micela and with Ada Menken, battered after falling from a horse. The artist died on August 10. Two months later, on October 22, Catherine Labay, the mother of his first son who had tried to marry his parents at the end of their lives, died.

Dumas spent the summer of 1869 in Brittany, where he worked on The Kitchen Dictionary. In March of the following year he submitted the work to a publisher. It was to be published after his death. In the spring of 1870, he left for the south of France. He was already very weak and hoped that the southern sun would strengthen him. In Marseilles he learned about the outbreak of war with Prussia and the first defeats of the French army. Under the influence of this news he suffered a stroke. Half paralyzed, he crawled to Puys, near Dieppe, where his son lived. Soon he stopped talking. He spent the last months of his life in his son”s villa. When the weather was nice he was driven in an armchair to the beach. He died on Monday, December 5, 1870, at six in the afternoon. He was buried at Neuville-les-Pollet, one kilometer from Dieppe. After the war, his son had his coffin transported to Villers-Cotterêts.

In 2002, at the request of the French president, his body was transferred to the Pantheon in Paris.

Alexandre Dumas” home, Château Monte Cristo, has been restored and opened to the public.

Dumas” books have been translated into nearly two hundred languages, and more than 200 films have been based on them.

The novel The Count of Monte Christo inspired François Taillandier to write its sequel, The Memoirs of the Count of Monte Christo, and Julius Verne to write the novel Matthew Sandorf.

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