Pierre-Marie-Charles de Bernard du Grail de la Villette
Encyclopedia
Biography
He was born in BesançonBesançon
Besançon , is the capital and principal city of the Franche-Comté region in eastern France. It had a population of about 237,000 inhabitants in the metropolitan area in 2008...
, member of a very ancient family of the Vivarais, was educated at the college of his native city, and studied for the law in Dijon and at Paris. He was awarded a prize by the Académie des Jeux Floraux
Académie des Jeux floraux
Académie des Jeux floraux , or Collège de la gaie science , is the most ancient literary institution of the western world. It was founded in 1323 by Clémence Isaure as the Consistori del Gay Saber with the goal of encouraging Occitan poetry...
for his Une fête de Neron in 1829. This first success in literature did not prevent him aspiring to the Magistrature, when the July Revolution
July Revolution
The French Revolution of 1830, also known as the July Revolution or in French, saw the overthrow of King Charles X of France, the French Bourbon monarch, and the ascent of his cousin Louis-Philippe, Duke of Orléans, who himself, after 18 precarious years on the throne, would in turn be overthrown...
broke out and induced him to enter politics.
He became one of the founders of the Gazette de Franche-Comté
Franche-Comté
Franche-Comté the former "Free County" of Burgundy, as distinct from the neighbouring Duchy, is an administrative region and a traditional province of eastern France...
and an article in the pages of that journal about La peau de chagrin
La Peau de chagrin
La Peau de chagrin is an 1831 novel by French novelist and playwright Honoré de Balzac . Set in early 19th-century Paris, it tells the story of a young man who finds a magic piece of shagreen that fulfills his every desire. For each wish granted, however, the skin shrinks and consumes a portion of...
earned him the thanks and the friendship of Honoré de Balzac
Honoré de Balzac
Honoré de Balzac was a French novelist and playwright. His magnum opus was a sequence of short stories and novels collectively entitled La Comédie humaine, which presents a panorama of French life in the years after the 1815 fall of Napoleon....
. The latter induced him to take up his domicile in Paris and introduced him to the art of novel-writing.
Writing
Bernard had published a volume of odes: 'Plus Deuil que Joie' (1838), which was not much noticed, but a series of stories in the same year gained him the reputation of a genial 'conteur'. They were collected under the title 'Le Noeud Gordien', and one of the tales, 'Une Aventure du Magistrat,' was adapted by Victorien SardouVictorien Sardou
Victorien Sardou was a French dramatist. He is best remembered today for his development, along with Eugène Scribe, of the well-made play...
for his comedy 'Pommes du voisin'.
'Gerfaut', generally acclaimed as his greatest work, crowned by the Academy, appeared also in 1838, then followed 'Le Paravent', another collection of short stories (1839); 'Les Ailes d'Icare' (1840); La Peau du Lion and La Chasse aux Amants (1841); L'Écueil (1842); Un Beau-père (1845); and 'Le Gentilhomme campagnard,' in 1847. Bernard wrote two comedies in collaboration with "Léonce" (Charles-Henri-Ladislas Laurençot, 1805–1862). A collection of Bernard's complete works in 12 volumes was published after his death. His writings have been mostly forgotten today.
Assessment by other writers
Jules Arsène Arnaud ClaretieJules Arsène Arnaud Claretie
Jules Arsène Arnaud Claretie was a French literary figure and director of the Théâtre Français.He was born at Limoges. After studying at the lycée Bonaparte in Paris, he became a journalist, achieving great success as dramatic critic to Le Figaro and to the Opinion nationale...
wrote about Bernard with much praise:
- He surpasses [Balzac] in energy and limpidity of composition. His style is elegant and cultured. His genius is most fully represented in a score or so of delightful tales ... full of invention and originality, and saturated with the purest and pleasantest essence of the spirit which ... made French literature the delight and recreation of Europe.
In The Paris Sketch Book http://www.gutenberg.org/etext/2768 William Makepeace Thackeray
William Makepeace Thackeray
William Makepeace Thackeray was an English novelist of the 19th century. He was famous for his satirical works, particularly Vanity Fair, a panoramic portrait of English society.-Biography:...
discusses Bernard's writing:
- M. de Bernard's characters are men and women of genteel society--rascals enough, but living in no state of convulsive crimes; and we follow him in his lively, malicious account of their manners, without risk of lighting upon any such horrors as Balzac or Dumas has provided for us.
Henry James
Henry James
Henry James, OM was an American-born writer, regarded as one of the key figures of 19th-century literary realism. He was the son of Henry James, Sr., a clergyman, and the brother of philosopher and psychologist William James and diarist Alice James....
, in his French Poets and Novelists
French Poets and Novelists
French Poets and Novelists is a book of literary criticism by Henry James published in 1878. The book collected essays that James had written over the preceding several years. From an early age James was fluent in French and read widely in the country's literature. These essays show a deep...
(1878), wrote:
- Charles de Bernard has at the present day hardly more than an historical value, and his novels are not to be recommended to people who have anything of especial importance at hand to read. But in speaking of the secondary French novelists it is but fair to allow him a comfortable niche, for if he be not especially worth studying he at least leaves you a very friendly feeling for him if he comes in your way.