Аннотация: What house did Dumas fils live in? A Literary Note
What house did Dumas fils live in? A Literary Note
André Maurois gives a description of the mansion in which Dumas fils [Dumas the son] lived:
'Dumas fils himself becomes one of the characters of own dramas. Journalists who visit him at his mansion on Avenue de Villiers, 98, are amazed at the "impressive appearance" of the house. The strict lobby seems to be as the portal of the temple rather than the entrance to the apartment. A pots with exotic plants are symmetrically placed ... The bust of Moliere. ... The main decoration of the house is a large gallery ... The house has more than four hundred paintings, good and bad ... On the bureau - a bronze hand, the hand of Dumas père [Dumas the father]. On all tables and shelves - hands, a plaster, a marble ones; hands of murderers, actresses, duchesses. Strange collection! Dumas rises early and lays down early. In the morning, he himself ... warms his own soup ... '(All citations in this article are from the book by André Maurois 'Three Dumas' ["Titans: A Three-Generation Biography of the Dumas"]).
(All quotations - translations from the Russian-language text).
Dumas fils was elected to the Academy, - unlike his father.
Dumas fils defends morality - in plays and in practice - in relations with women ... "Love, the relationship of a man and a woman, parents and a child - these are his constant topics."
"He is rich, very rich. His royalties are very substantial, and his father's royalties, since the old Satyr was gone [died] and and no one wasting them, accumulate at Michel Levy. And the current account of Dumas père again became quite creditable [became impressive]."
'With Leopold Lacourt, a young teacher from Nevers who wrote an essay about Dumas fils' plays, he was frank. Dumas invited him to talk with him. Lacourt was very excited to meet this true king of the French scene.
'I took advantage of the Easter holidays (1879) to go at his invitation to Avenue de Villiers, 98, where he had a mansion of medium size and of a very a simple appearance - it resembled a country house of an average bourgeois. His only luxury was a rather hefty art gallery on the second floor ...
... For the most part there were things that were valuable not in themselves, but by a names under them, which were highly valued during the Second Empire. They were nothing more than a curious.... "
With some imagination, we can say that Dumas fils lived in two houses - firstly, in the house of Dumas père, and secondly, in his own ...
The plaster hands may have inspired and encouraged humility.
If that part of the book by André Maurois, which is dedicated to the Dumas fils' biography, was read on a sunny day and in a good mood, so you can think that it was, in general, a completely happy life ... A life of a fairly successful European, French, Parisian writer , partly - a rentier ...
November 23, 2019 20:43
Translation from Russian into English: November 23, 2019 22:37.
Владимир Владимирович Залесский 'В каком доме жил Дюма-сын? Литературная заметка'.