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ALEXANDRE DUMAS fils - French
Dramatist
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The French author
Alexandre Dumas, known as Dumas fils, b. July 27, 1824, d.
Nov. 27, 1895, was the illegitimate son of Alexandre Dumas
père. Like his illustrious father, he wrote novels and
plays, establishing the genre known as the problem, or thesis, play.
His output was copious, but it far from equalled the avalanche of
works produced by his father. But Dumas fils, unlike his
father, worked without collaborators.
Dumas's most famous
work is La Dame aux camelias, known in English as Camille,
which appeared both as a novel (1848; Eng. trans., 1931) and as a
play (1852; Eng. trans., 1956). The theatrical version became and
remains world famous, serving as a vehicle for such actresses as
Sarah Bernhardt, Edwige Feuillere, and Greta Garbo; it also inspired
Verdi's opera La Traviata. It is the story of a Parisian courtesan
purified and morally regenerated by the passion of love.
Another of his
widely popular plays, Le Demi-Monde (1855; Eng. trans., 1858;
trans. as The Outer Edge of Society, 1921), deals with the same
milieu as that of Camille.
In his choice of
subjects, Dumas fils pointed the way toward the naturalism of
such authors as Emile Zola. His father's tastes and abilities favored
the historical novel and the adventure tale, but Dumas fils preferred
to write of contemporary society. Although vestiges of romanticism
can be noted in his works, Dumas fils attempted to analyze the social
ills of his times. The tone of his work is somewhat moralizing, but
his plays have remained attractive to theater audiences because he
gives his characters' emotions free range. His other novels and
plays, less well known today, include Tristan le Roux (1850)
and L'Affaire Clemenceau (1866). He was admitted to the
Académie Française in 1875.
Joseph A. Reiter, Assistant Professor of Modern Languages, Phillips Exeter Academy, Exeter, N.H.
Source: 1997 Grolier Multimedia Encyclopedia v.9.0.1
Bibliography: Francis Gribble, Dumas: Father and Son (1930; repr. 1973);
André Maurois, The Titans: A Three-Generation Biography of the Dumas,
trans. by Gerard Hopkins (1957; repr. 1971);
H. Stanley Schwarz, Alexandre Dumas Fils: Dramatist (1927).
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