Victor Hugo (
February 26,
1802 -
May 22,
1885) was the most important of the
Romantic authors in the
French language.
Born in Besançon, Doubs in the region of Franche-Comté. One of the most powerful and popular authors of 19th century France, and a champion of republicanism exiled during the reign of Napoleon III and returned in 1870.
Major works include novels and a large body of poetry. His death, and the spontaneous national mourning which followed, inspired the French government to reinvent The Panthéon in Paris as a temple in homage to the great men (and, eventually, women) of France. He is buried in its necropolis.
Although Hugo is better known to the English-speaking world as a novelist, it was as a poet that he broke new ground. The French poetic traditions were as well-established in his time as the English ones were before the time of the Romantic poets, and Hugo's contribution may be compared with that of Wordsworth. He believed that the poet's purpose should be two-fold:
- to echo universal sentiment by revealing his own feelings, uniting the voices of mankind, nature and history.
- to guide the reader: "faire flamboyer l'avenir" - to lead the way.
In his epic, La Légende des Siècles, he attempts, by reference to historical events, to depict humanity's struggle to emerge from obscurity into enlightenment.
Honorary President and founder of the Association Littéraire et Artistique Internationale (ALAI) in 1878 in Paris which gave itself the objective of creating an international convention for the protection of literary and artistic properties which was achieved eight years later with the Berne Convention on September 9, 1886.
- Odes et Poésies Diverses (1822)
- Nouvelles Odes (1824)
- Bug-Jargal (1826)
- Odes et Ballades (1826)
- Cromwell (1827)
- Les Orientales (1829)
- Le Dernier jour d'un condamné (1829)
- Hernani (1830), (now remembered mainly as the source for Verdi's opera Ernani) - at the time when this drama was staged, it was so insurrectionist in style and content that it caused nightly riots at the La Comédie Française[?].)
- Notre-Dame de Paris (1831), (The Hunchback of Notre Dame)
- Marion Delorme (1831)
- Les Feuilles d'automne
- Le Roi s'amuse (1832)
- Lucrèce Borgia (1833)
- Marie Tudor (1833)
- Étude sur Mirabeau (1834)
- Littérature et philosophie mêlées (1834)
- Claude Gueux (1834)
- Angelo (1835)
- Les Chants du crépuscule (1835)
- Les Voix intérieures (1837)
- Ruy Blas (1838)
- Les Rayons et les ombres (1840)
- Le Rhin (1842)
- Les Burgraves (1843)
- Napoléon le Petit (1852)
- Les Châtiments (1853)
- Lettres à Louis Bonaparte(1855)
- Les Contemplations (1856)
- La Légende des siècles (1859)
- Les Misérables (1862)
- William Shakespeare (1864)
- Les Chansons des rues et des bois (1865)
- Les Travailleurs de la Mer(1866)
- Paris-Guide (1867)
- L'Homme qui rit (1869)
- L'Année terrible (1872)
- Quatrevingt-Treize (1874)
- Mes Fils (1874)
- Actes et paroles - Avant l'exil (1875)
- Actes et paroles - Pendant l'exil (1875)
- Actes et paroles - Depuis l'exil (1876)
- La Légende des Siècles 2e série (1877)
- L'Art d'être grand-père (1877)
- Histoire d'un crime - 1re partie (1877)
- Histoire d'un crime - 2e partie (1878)
- Le Pape (1878)
- Religions et religion (1880)
- L'Âne (1880)
- Les Quatres vents de l'esprit (1881)
- Torquemada (1882)
- La Légende des siècles - Tome III (1883)
- L'Archipel de la Manche(1883)
Published posthumously:
- Théâtre en liberté(1886)
- La fin de Satan (1886)
- Choses vues - 1re série(1887)
- Toute la lyre (1888)
- Alpes et Pyrénées (1890)
- Dieu (1891)
- France et Belgique (1892)
- Toute la lyre - nouvelle série (1893)
- Correspondances - Tome I (1896)
- Correspondances - Tome II (1898)
- Les années funestes (1898)
- Choses vues - 2e série (1900)
- Post-scriptum de ma vie (1901)
- Dernière Gerbe (1902)
- Mille francs de récompense (1934)
- Océan. Tas de pierres (1942)
- Pierres (1951)
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