Léon Gozlan
Encyclopedia
Marseille
Marseille , known in antiquity as Massalia , is the second largest city in France, after Paris, with a population of 852,395 within its administrative limits on a land area of . The urban area of Marseille extends beyond the city limits with a population of over 1,420,000 on an area of...
- September 14, 1866, Paris
Paris
Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...
), was a French
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...
Jewish
Judaism
Judaism ) is the "religion, philosophy, and way of life" of the Jewish people...
novelist and playwright
Playwright
A playwright, also called a dramatist, is a person who writes plays.The term is not a variant spelling of "playwrite", but something quite distinct: the word wright is an archaic English term for a craftsman or builder...
. He was born in Marseille
Marseille
Marseille , known in antiquity as Massalia , is the second largest city in France, after Paris, with a population of 852,395 within its administrative limits on a land area of . The urban area of Marseille extends beyond the city limits with a population of over 1,420,000 on an area of...
.
When he was still a boy, his father, who had made a large fortune as a ship-broker, met with a series of misfortunes, and Léon, before completing his education, had to go to sea in order to earn a living. In 1828 we find him in Paris
Paris
Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...
, determined to run the risks of literary life. His townsman, Joseph Méry, who was then making himself famous by his political satires, introduced him to several newspapers, and Gozlan's brilliant articles in the Figaro did much harm to the already tottering government of Charles X
Charles X of France
Charles X was known for most of his life as the Comte d'Artois before he reigned as King of France and of Navarre from 16 September 1824 until 2 August 1830. A younger brother to Kings Louis XVI and Louis XVIII, he supported the latter in exile and eventually succeeded him...
.
His first novel was Les Mémoires d'un apothécaire (1828), and this was followed by numberless others, among which may be mentioned:
- Washington Levers et Socrate Leblanc (1838)
- Le Notaire de Chantilly (1836)
- Aristide Froissart (1843) (one of the most curious and celebrated of his productions)
- Les Nuits du Père Lachaise (1846)
- Le Tapis vert (1855)
- Le Folle du logis (1857)
- Les Emotions de Polydore Marasquin (1857)
His best-known works for the theatre are:
- La Pluie et le beau temps (1861)
- Une Tempête dans un verre d'eau (1850), two curtain-raisers which have kept the stage
- Le Lion empaill (1848)
- La Queue du chien d'Alcibiade (1849)
- Louise de Nanteuil (1854)
- Le Gâteau des reines (1855)
- Les Paniers de la comtesse (1852)
He adapted several of his own novels to the stage. Gozlan also wrote a romantic and picturesque description of the old manors and mansions of his country entitled Les Châteaux de France (2 vols, 1844), originally published (1836) as Les Tourelles, which has some archaeological value, and a biographical essay on 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....
(Balzac chez lui, 1862).
He was made a member of the Legion of Honour in 1846, and in 1859 an officer of that order. Gozlan died on the 14th of September 1866, in Paris.
See also P Audebrand, Léon Gozlan (1887).
See also Martha Katherine Loder, "The Life and Novels of Léon Gozlan: A Representative of Literary Cross Currents in the Generation of Balzac" (1943).
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