Antoine Jay
Encyclopedia
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
writer, journalist, historian and politician.
Life
At first an Oratorian at NiortNiort
Niort is a commune in the Deux-Sèvres department in western France.The Latin name of the city was Novioritum.The population of Niort is 60,486 and more than 137,000 people live in the urban area....
, he studied law at Toulouse
Toulouse
Toulouse is a city in the Haute-Garonne department in southwestern FranceIt lies on the banks of the River Garonne, 590 km away from Paris and half-way between the Atlantic Ocean and the Mediterranean Sea...
and became a lawyer, then briefly administrator of the district of Libourne
Libourne
Libourne is a commune in the Gironde department in Aquitaine in southwestern France. It is a sub-prefecture of the department.It is the wine-making capital of northern Gironde and lies near Saint-Émilion and Pomerol.-Geography:...
. He travelled to Canada
Canada
Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...
and the USA between 1795 and 1802 to escape the French Revolution
French Revolution
The French Revolution , sometimes distinguished as the 'Great French Revolution' , was a period of radical social and political upheaval in France and Europe. The absolute monarchy that had ruled France for centuries collapsed in three years...
, making friends with Thomas Jefferson
Thomas Jefferson
Thomas Jefferson was the principal author of the United States Declaration of Independence and the Statute of Virginia for Religious Freedom , the third President of the United States and founder of the University of Virginia...
and teaching French to Lemuel Shaw
Lemuel Shaw
Lemuel Shaw was an American jurist who served as Chief Justice of the Massachusetts Supreme Court...
.
From 1803 to 1809, he was tutor to the sons of Joseph Fouché
Joseph Fouché
Joseph Fouché, 1st Duc d'Otrante was a French statesman and Minister of Police under Napoleon Bonaparte. In English texts his title is often translated as Duke of Otranto.-Youth:Fouché was born in Le Pellerin, a small village near Nantes...
, before serving as a civil servant in the Ministry of Police, where he translated English newspapers. He contributed to the Journal des Voyages and L'Abeille, participated in the foundation of Constitutionnel
Le Constitutionnel
Le Constitutionnel was a French political and literary newspaper, founded in Paris during the Hundred Days by Joseph Fouché. Originally established in October 1815 as The Independent, it took its current name during the Second Restoration. A voice for Liberals, Bonapartists, and critics of the...
and La Minerve française
La Minerve (French newspaper)
La Minerve, later La Minerve française, was a daily French newspaper first published on 1 April 1818. Liberal and in favour of the Charte constitutionnelle, it was suspected under the Bourbon Restoration of being the organ of Bonapartists and Republicans...
, and edited the Journal de Paris. He was an influential opposition journalist, who had supported the French Revolution
French Revolution
The French Revolution , sometimes distinguished as the 'Great French Revolution' , was a period of radical social and political upheaval in France and Europe. The absolute monarchy that had ruled France for centuries collapsed in three years...
and First French Empire
First French Empire
The First French Empire , also known as the Greater French Empire or Napoleonic Empire, was the empire of Napoleon I of France...
(serving as a deputy in the Chambre of the Hundred Days
Hundred Days
The Hundred Days, sometimes known as the Hundred Days of Napoleon or Napoleon's Hundred Days for specificity, marked the period between Emperor Napoleon I of France's return from exile on Elba to Paris on 20 March 1815 and the second restoration of King Louis XVIII on 8 July 1815...
and favouring the handover of Napoleon
Napoleon I of France
Napoleon Bonaparte was a French military and political leader during the latter stages of the French Revolution.As Napoleon I, he was Emperor of the French from 1804 to 1815...
to the Allies after ), opposing the Bourbon Restoration
Bourbon Restoration
The Bourbon Restoration is the name given to the period following the successive events of the French Revolution , the end of the First Republic , and then the forcible end of the First French Empire under Napoleon – when a coalition of European powers restored by arms the monarchy to the...
and finally seeing the triumph of his political ideal in 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...
. He was mayor of Lagorce
Lagorce
Lagorce may refer to:*Places:** Lagorce, Ardèche, a commune in Ardèche, France** Lagorce, Gironde, a commune in Gironde, France** LaGorce Island, Miami Beach, Florida*People:*Franck Lagorce, a French racing driver...
(1830–1848), conseiller général for the Gironde
Gironde
For the Revolutionary party, see Girondists.Gironde is a common name for the Gironde estuary, where the mouths of the Garonne and Dordogne rivers merge, and for a department in the Aquitaine region situated in southwest France.-History:...
(1831–1837) and deputy for the Gironde (1815, 1831, 1834).
He came to note for his Histoire du ministère du cardinal de Richelieu (1815) and his elogies of Corneille
Pierre Corneille
Pierre Corneille was a French tragedian who was one of the three great seventeenth-century French dramatists, along with Molière and Racine...
and Montaigne (published in his Tableau littéraire de la France pendant le XVIIIe siècle in 1818). He, Antoine-Vincent Arnault
Antoine-Vincent Arnault
Antoine-Vincent Arnault was a French dramatist.Arnault was born in Paris. His first play, Marius à Minturne , immediately established his reputation. A year later he followed with a second republican tragedy, Lucrèce. Arnault left France during the Reign of Terror, but on his return, he was...
, Jacques de Norvins and Étienne de Jouy then collaborated on a Biographie nouvelle des contemporains, for which he notably edited an article on Jean-Baptiste Boyer-Fonfrède
Jean-Baptiste Boyer-Fonfrède
Jean-Baptiste Boyer-Fonfrède was a French Girondin politician.A deputy to the National Convention from his native city, Bordeaux, he voted for the death of Louis XVI, denounced the September Massacres and accused Jean-Paul Marat...
which led to his imprisonment for a month in the prison Sainte-Pélagie. However, he is best known for his Conversion d'un romantique (1830), in which he staunchly opposes romanticism
Romanticism
Romanticism was an artistic, literary and intellectual movement that originated in the second half of the 18th century in Europe, and gained strength in reaction to the Industrial Revolution...
, writing:
His opposition to romanticism even went so far as voting against Victor Hugo
Victor Hugo
Victor-Marie Hugo was a Frenchpoet, playwright, novelist, essayist, visual artist, statesman, human rights activist and exponent of the Romantic movement in France....
's election to the Académie française
Académie française
L'Académie française , also called the French Academy, is the pre-eminent French learned body on matters pertaining to the French language. The Académie was officially established in 1635 by Cardinal Richelieu, the chief minister to King Louis XIII. Suppressed in 1793 during the French Revolution,...
in 1841 (Jay had been elected to the Académie himself in 1832 and was "one of [its] best sleepers" according to a contemporary).
Works
- Le Glaneur, ou Essais de Nicolas Freeman (1812)
- Les États-Unis et l'Angleterre, ou Souvenirs et réflexions d'un citoyen américain [aka William LeeWilliam Lee-Miscellaneous:*William Lee , Roman Catholic bishop*William Lee , Roman Catholic bishop*William Lee , colonial writer and ship's captain...
], essais traduits sur le manuscrit de l'auteur (1814) - Histoire du ministère du cardinal de Richelieu (2 volumes, 1815)
- Voyages dans la partie septentrionale du BrésilBrazilBrazil , officially the Federative Republic of Brazil , is the largest country in South America. It is the world's fifth largest country, both by geographical area and by population with over 192 million people...
, depuis 1809 jusqu'en 1815, par Henri Koster, traduits de l'anglais (2 volumes, 1818) - Recueil de pièces authentiques sur le captif de Sainte-Hélène, de mémoires et documents écrits ou dictés par l'empereur Napoleon ; suivis de lettres de MM. le grand-maréchal comte Bertrand, le comte Las Cases, le général baron Gourgaud, le général comte Montholon, les docteurs Warden, O'Meara et Autommarchi [sic], et plusieurs personnages de haute distinction (12 volumes, 1821–25)
- Salon d'Horace VernetHorace VernetÉmile Jean-Horace Vernet was a French painter of battles, portraits, and Orientalist Arab subjects.Vernet was born to Carle Vernet, another famous painter, who was himself a son of Claude Joseph Vernet. He was born in the Paris Louvre, while his parents were staying there during the French...
, analyse historique et pittoresque des 45 tableaux exposés chez lui en 1822 (In collaboration with Étienne de Jouy, 1822) - Les Hermites en prison, ou Consolations de Sainte-Pélagie (2 volumes in collaboration with Étienne de Jouy, 1823)
- Les Hermites en liberté, pour faire suite aux « Hermites en prison » (4 volumes in collaboration with Étienne de Jouy, 1824)
- La Conversion d'un romantique, manuscrit de Joseph Delorme, suivi de deux lettres sur la littérature du siècle et d'un essai sur l'éloquence politique en France (1830)
- Œuvres littéraires (4 volumes, 1831)
- La Piété filiale, ou Histoire de Pauline (1852)
Online texts
- Tableau littéraire de la France pendant le XVIIIe siècle ; Éloge de Montaigne ; Précis historique sur la vie et les ouvrages de l'abbé Raynal http://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/bpt6k2023891.pdf
- Considérations sur l'état politique de l'Europe, sur celui de la France, sur la censure et les élections, ou Supplément aux « Documents historiques » de M. Kératry http://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/bpt6k36435s.pdf
- Conversion d'un romantique ; Essai sur l'éloquence politique en France http://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/bpt6k202386w.pdf
- Essais sur les mœurs ; Mélanges de littérature http://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/bpt6k202388n
- Nouvelles américaines ; Dialogue des morts ; Mélanges de littérature http://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/bpt6k2023878.pdf