Octave Mirbeau
Encyclopedia
Octave Mirbeau was a French journalist
, art critic
, travel writer, pamphleteer
, novelist, and playwright
, who achieved celebrity in Europe and great success among the public, while still appealing to the literary and artistic avant-garde
. His work has been translated into thirty languages.
, Rémalard
, pursuing secondary studies at a Jesuit college in Vannes
, which expelled him at the age of fifteen. Two years after the traumatic experience of the 1870 war
, he was tempted by a call from the Bonapartist
leader Dugué de la Fauconnerie, who hired him as private secretary and introduced him to L'Ordre de Paris.
After his debut in journalism in the service of the Bonapartists, and his debut in literature when he worked as a ghostwriter
, Mirbeau began to publish under his own name. Thereafter, he wrote in order to express his own ethical principles and aesthetic values. A supporter of the anarchist cause (cf. Voters strike) and fervent supporter of Alfred Dreyfus
, Mirbeau embodied the intellectual who involved himself in civic issues. Independent of all parties, Mirbeau believed that one’s primary duty was to remain lucid.
As an art critic, he campaigned on behalf of the “great gods nearest to his heart”: he sang the praises of Auguste Rodin
, Claude Monet
, Camille Pissarro
, Paul Cézanne
, Paul Gauguin
, Auguste Renoir, Félix Vallotton
, and Pierre Bonnard
, and was an early advocate of Vincent Van Gogh
, Camille Claudel
, Aristide Maillol
, and Maurice Utrillo
(cf. Combats esthétiques).
As a literary critic and early member of Académie Goncourt
, he 'discovered' Maurice Maeterlinck
and Marguerite Audoux
and admired Remy de Gourmont
, Marcel Schwob
, Léon Bloy
, Georges Rodenbach
, Alfred Jarry
, Charles-Louis Philippe
, Émile Guillaumin, Valery Larbaud
and Léon Werth
(cf. his Combats littéraires).
(Calvary, 1886), in which writing allowed him to overcome the trauma
tic effects of his devastating liaison with the ill-reputed Judith Vimmer, renamed Juliette Roux in the novel. In 1888, Mirbeau published L'Abbé Jules (Abbé Jules
), the first pre-Freudian novel written under the influence of Dostoyevsky to appear in French literature; the text featured two main characters: l’abbé Jules and Father Pamphile. In Sébastien Roch (1890) (English translation : Sébastien Roch
, 2000), Mirbeau purged the traumatic effects of his experience as a student at a Jesuits school in Vannes
. In the novel, the 13-year old Sébastien is sexually abused by a priest at the school and the abuse destroys his life.
Mirbeau then underwent a grave existential
and literary crisis, yet during this time, he still published in serial form a pre-existentialist novel about the artist’s fate, Dans le ciel
(In the Sky), introducing the figure of a painter directly modeled on Van Gogh. In the aftermath of the Dreyfus Affair
- which exacerbated Mirbeau’s pessimism - he published two novels judged to be scandalous by self-styled paragons of virtue : Le Jardin des supplices (Torture Garden
(1899) and Le Journal d'une femme de chambre (Diary of a Chambermaid) (1900), then Les Vingt et un Jours d'un neurasthénique
(1901). In these works, Mirbeau unsettled traditional novelistic conventions, practicing the technique of collage
, transgressing the code of verisimilitude and fictional credibility, and defying the hypocritical rules of propriety.
(1907) and Dingo
(1913), he strayed ever further from realism
, giving free rein to fantasy
elements and casting his car and his own dog as heroes. Because of the indeterminacy of their genre affiliation, these last Mirbeau stories show how completely he had broken with the conventions of realist fiction.
(The Bad Shepherds, 1897). Then he experienced worldwide acclaim with Les affaires sont les affaires (Business is business
1903) - his classical comedy of manners
and characters in the tradition of Molière
. Here Mirbeau featured the character of Isidore Lechat, predecessor of the modern master of business intrigue, a product of the new world, a figure who makes money from everything and spreads his tentacles out over the world.
In 1908 - at the end of a long legal and media battle - Mirbeau saw his play Le Foyer (Home) performed by the Comédie-Française
. In this work, he broached a new taboo subject, the economic and sexual exploitation of adolescents in a home that pretended to be a charitable one.
He also wrote six one act play
s, published under the title of Farces et moralités
(1904), among them being L'Épidémie (Epidemics). Here, Mirbeau can be seen as anticipating the theatre of Bertolt Brecht
, Marcel Aymé
, Harold Pinter
, and Eugène Ionesco
. He calls language itself into question, demystifying law, ridiculing the discourse of politicians, and making fun of the language of love.
But, more recently, Mirbeau has been rediscovered and presented in a new light. A fuller appreciation of the role he played in the political, literary, and artistic world of la Belle Epoque
is emerging.
Mirbeau lies buried in the Passy Cemetery
, in the XVIe arrondissement
of Paris
.
Journalist
A journalist collects and distributes news and other information. A journalist's work is referred to as journalism.A reporter is a type of journalist who researchs, writes, and reports on information to be presented in mass media, including print media , electronic media , and digital media A...
, art critic
Art critic
An art critic is a person who specializes in evaluating art. Their written critiques, or reviews, are published in newspapers, magazines, books and on web sites...
, travel writer, pamphleteer
Pamphleteer
A pamphleteer is a historical term for someone who creates or distributes pamphlets. Pamphlets were used to broadcast the writer's opinions on an issue, for example, in order to get people to vote for their favorite politician or to articulate a particular political ideology.A famous pamphleteer...
, 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...
, who achieved celebrity in Europe and great success among the public, while still appealing to the literary and artistic avant-garde
Avant-garde
Avant-garde means "advance guard" or "vanguard". The adjective form is used in English to refer to people or works that are experimental or innovative, particularly with respect to art, culture, and politics....
. His work has been translated into thirty languages.
Aesthetic and political struggles
Mirbeau spent his childhood in a village of the NormandyNormandy
Normandy is a geographical region corresponding to the former Duchy of Normandy. It is in France.The continental territory covers 30,627 km² and forms the preponderant part of Normandy and roughly 5% of the territory of France. It is divided for administrative purposes into two régions:...
, Rémalard
Rémalard
Rémalard is a commune in the Orne department in north-western France.-References:*...
, pursuing secondary studies at a Jesuit college in Vannes
Vannes
Vannes is a commune in the Morbihan department in Brittany in north-western France. It was founded over 2000 years ago.-Geography:Vannes is located on the Gulf of Morbihan at the mouth of two rivers, the Marle and the Vincin. It is around 100 km northwest of Nantes and 450 km south west...
, which expelled him at the age of fifteen. Two years after the traumatic experience of the 1870 war
Franco-Prussian War
The Franco-Prussian War or Franco-German War, often referred to in France as the 1870 War was a conflict between the Second French Empire and the Kingdom of Prussia. Prussia was aided by the North German Confederation, of which it was a member, and the South German states of Baden, Württemberg and...
, he was tempted by a call from the Bonapartist
Bonapartist
In French political history, Bonapartism has two meanings. In a strict sense, this term refers to people who aimed to restore the French Empire under the House of Bonaparte, the Corsican family of Napoleon Bonaparte and his nephew Louis...
leader Dugué de la Fauconnerie, who hired him as private secretary and introduced him to L'Ordre de Paris.
After his debut in journalism in the service of the Bonapartists, and his debut in literature when he worked as a ghostwriter
Ghostwriter
A ghostwriter is a professional writer who is paid to write books, articles, stories, reports, or other texts that are officially credited to another person. Celebrities, executives, and political leaders often hire ghostwriters to draft or edit autobiographies, magazine articles, or other written...
, Mirbeau began to publish under his own name. Thereafter, he wrote in order to express his own ethical principles and aesthetic values. A supporter of the anarchist cause (cf. Voters strike) and fervent supporter of Alfred Dreyfus
Alfred Dreyfus
Alfred Dreyfus was a French artillery officer of Jewish background whose trial and conviction in 1894 on charges of treason became one of the most tense political dramas in modern French and European history...
, Mirbeau embodied the intellectual who involved himself in civic issues. Independent of all parties, Mirbeau believed that one’s primary duty was to remain lucid.
As an art critic, he campaigned on behalf of the “great gods nearest to his heart”: he sang the praises of Auguste Rodin
Auguste Rodin
François-Auguste-René Rodin , known as Auguste Rodin , was a French sculptor. Although Rodin is generally considered the progenitor of modern sculpture, he did not set out to rebel against the past...
, Claude Monet
Claude Monet
Claude Monet was a founder of French impressionist painting, and the most consistent and prolific practitioner of the movement's philosophy of expressing one's perceptions before nature, especially as applied to plein-air landscape painting. . Retrieved 6 January 2007...
, Camille Pissarro
Camille Pissarro
Camille Pissarro was a French Impressionist and Neo-Impressionist painter born on the island of St Thomas . His importance resides in his contributions to both Impressionism and Post-Impressionism, as he was the only artist to exhibit in both forms...
, Paul Cézanne
Paul Cézanne
Paul Cézanne was a French artist and Post-Impressionist painter whose work laid the foundations of the transition from the 19th century conception of artistic endeavour to a new and radically different world of art in the 20th century. Cézanne can be said to form the bridge between late 19th...
, Paul Gauguin
Paul Gauguin
Eugène Henri Paul Gauguin was a leading French Post-Impressionist artist. He was an important figure in the Symbolist movement as a painter, sculptor, print-maker, ceramist, and writer...
, Auguste Renoir, Félix Vallotton
Félix Vallotton
Félix Edouard Vallotton was a Swiss painter and printmaker associated with Les Nabis. He was an important figure in the development of the modern woodcut.-Life and work:...
, and Pierre Bonnard
Pierre Bonnard
Pierre Bonnard was a French painter and printmaker, as well as a founding member of Les Nabis.-Biography:...
, and was an early advocate of Vincent Van Gogh
Vincent van Gogh
Vincent Willem van Gogh , and used Brabant dialect in his writing; it is therefore likely that he himself pronounced his name with a Brabant accent: , with a voiced V and palatalized G and gh. In France, where much of his work was produced, it is...
, Camille Claudel
Camille Claudel
Camille Claudel was a French sculptor and graphic artist. She was the elder sister of the poet and diplomat Paul Claudel.- Early years :...
, Aristide Maillol
Aristide Maillol
Aristide Maillol or Aristides Maillol was a French Catalan sculptor and painter.-Biography:...
, and Maurice Utrillo
Maurice Utrillo
Maurice Utrillo, , born Maurice Valadon, was a French painter who specialized in cityscapes. Born in the Montmartre quarter of Paris, France, Utrillo is one of the few famous painters of Montmartre who were born there....
(cf. Combats esthétiques).
As a literary critic and early member of Académie Goncourt
Académie Goncourt
The Société littéraire des Goncourt , usually called the académie Goncourt , is a French literary organization based in Paris. It was founded by the French writer and publisher Edmond de Goncourt...
, he 'discovered' Maurice Maeterlinck
Maurice Maeterlinck
Maurice Polydore Marie Bernard Maeterlinck, also called Comte Maeterlinck from 1932, was a Belgian playwright, poet, and essayist who wrote in French. He was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1911. The main themes in his work are death and the meaning of life...
and Marguerite Audoux
Marguerite Audoux
Marguerite Audoux was a French novelist.- Biography :Marguerite Donquichote, who took her mother's name, Audoux, in 1895, was orphaned by age three, following the death of her mother and abandonment by her father...
and admired Remy de Gourmont
Remy de Gourmont
Remy de Gourmont was a French Symbolist poet, novelist, and influential critic. He was widely read in his era, and an important influence on Blaise Cendrars...
, Marcel Schwob
Marcel Schwob
Marcel Schwob was a Jewish French writer.-Biography:He was born in Chaville, Hauts-de-Seine on 23 August 1867...
, Léon Bloy
Léon Bloy
Léon Bloy , was a French novelist, essayist, pamphleteer and poet.-Biography:Bloy was born in Notre-Dame-de-Sanilhac, in the arondissement of Périgueux, Dordogne. He was the second of six sons of Voltairean freethinker and stern disciplinarian Jean Baptiste Bloy and his wife Anne-Marie Carreau,...
, Georges Rodenbach
Georges Rodenbach
Georges Raymond Constantin Rodenbach was a Belgian Symbolist poet and novelist.- Biography :Georges Rodenbach was born in Tournai to a French mother and a German father from the Rhineland . He went to school in Ghent at the prestigious Sint-Barbaracollege, where he became friends with the poet...
, Alfred Jarry
Alfred Jarry
Alfred Jarry was a French writer born in Laval, Mayenne, France, not far from the border of Brittany; he was of Breton descent on his mother's side....
, Charles-Louis Philippe
Charles-Louis Philippe
Charles-Louis Philippe, French novelist, was born in Cérilly, Allier, Auvergne, on 4 August 1874, and died in Paris on 21 December 1909.- Life :...
, Émile Guillaumin, Valery Larbaud
Valery Larbaud
Valery Larbaud was a French writer.-Life:He was born in Vichy, Allier, the only child of a pharmacist. His father died when he was 8, and he was brought up by his mother and aunt. His father had been owner of the Vichy Saint-Yorre mineral water springs, and the family fortune assured him an easy...
and Léon Werth
Léon Werth
Léon Werth was a French writer and art critic, a friend of Octave Mirbeau, then of Antoine de Saint-Exupéry.Léon Werth wrote critically and with great precision on French society through World War I, colonization, and on French "collaboration" during World War II.Saint-Exupéry met Werth in 1931...
(cf. his Combats littéraires).
Autobiographical novels
After authoring ten ghostwritten novels, he made his own literary debut with Le CalvaireLe Calvaire
Le Calvaire is a novel written by the French journalist, novelist and playwright Octave Mirbeau, and published by Ollendorff in 1886.- Plot summary :...
(Calvary, 1886), in which writing allowed him to overcome the trauma
Psychological trauma
Psychological trauma is a type of damage to the psyche that occurs as a result of a traumatic event...
tic effects of his devastating liaison with the ill-reputed Judith Vimmer, renamed Juliette Roux in the novel. In 1888, Mirbeau published L'Abbé Jules (Abbé Jules
Abbé Jules
L'Abbé Jules is a novel written by the French journalist, novelist and playwright Octave Mirbeau, and published by Ollendorff in 1888.- Plot summary :...
), the first pre-Freudian novel written under the influence of Dostoyevsky to appear in French literature; the text featured two main characters: l’abbé Jules and Father Pamphile. In Sébastien Roch (1890) (English translation : Sébastien Roch
Sébastien Roch
Sébastien Roch is a novel written by the French journalist, novelist and playwright Octave Mirbeau, and published by Charpentier in 1890. Last French edition : L'Age d'Homme, 2011....
, 2000), Mirbeau purged the traumatic effects of his experience as a student at a Jesuits school in Vannes
Vannes
Vannes is a commune in the Morbihan department in Brittany in north-western France. It was founded over 2000 years ago.-Geography:Vannes is located on the Gulf of Morbihan at the mouth of two rivers, the Marle and the Vincin. It is around 100 km northwest of Nantes and 450 km south west...
. In the novel, the 13-year old Sébastien is sexually abused by a priest at the school and the abuse destroys his life.
Crisis of the novel
Existential crisis
An existential crisis is a stage of development at which an individual questions the very foundations of his or her life: whether his or her life has any meaning, purpose or value...
and literary crisis, yet during this time, he still published in serial form a pre-existentialist novel about the artist’s fate, Dans le ciel
Dans le ciel
Dans le ciel is a novel written by the French journalist, novelist and playwright Octave Mirbeau. First published in serialized installments in L’Écho de Paris between September 1892 and May 1893, Dans le ciel, assembled and edited by Pierre Michel and Jean-François Nivet, first appeared its...
(In the Sky), introducing the figure of a painter directly modeled on Van Gogh. In the aftermath of the Dreyfus Affair
Dreyfus Affair
The Dreyfus affair was a political scandal that divided France in the 1890s and the early 1900s. It involved the conviction for treason in November 1894 of Captain Alfred Dreyfus, a young French artillery officer of Alsatian Jewish descent...
- which exacerbated Mirbeau’s pessimism - he published two novels judged to be scandalous by self-styled paragons of virtue : Le Jardin des supplices (Torture Garden
The Torture Garden (novel)
The Torture Garden is a novel written by the French journalist, novelist and playwright Octave Mirbeau and was first published in 1899, during the Dreyfus Affair...
(1899) and Le Journal d'une femme de chambre (Diary of a Chambermaid) (1900), then Les Vingt et un Jours d'un neurasthénique
Les Vingt et un Jours d'un neurasthénique
Les Vingt et un Jours d'un neurasthénique is an expressionist novel by the French writer Octave Mirbeau, published by Charpentier-Fasquelle in August of 1901.- Commentary :...
(1901). In these works, Mirbeau unsettled traditional novelistic conventions, practicing the technique of collage
Collage
A collage is a work of formal art, primarily in the visual arts, made from an assemblage of different forms, thus creating a new whole....
, transgressing the code of verisimilitude and fictional credibility, and defying the hypocritical rules of propriety.
Death of the novel
In his last two novels - La 628-E8La 628-E8
La 628-E8 is a 'novel' by the French novelist and playwright Octave Mirbeau, published by Fasquelle in 1907. La 628-E8 is noteworthy for its genre indeterminacy. Part travelogue, part fantasy, part cultural commentary and critique, Mirbeau’s book highlights its own unclassifiability: “Is it a...
(1907) and Dingo
Dingo (novel)
-Plot summary:Completed by Mirbeau’s long-time friend Léon Werth, when the author’s ill health prevented him from writing the concluding chapters, Dingo, Mirbeau’s final novel, appeared in completed form with Fasquelle in 1913...
(1913), he strayed ever further from realism
Realism (arts)
Realism in the visual arts and literature refers to the general attempt to depict subjects "in accordance with secular, empirical rules", as they are considered to exist in third person objective reality, without embellishment or interpretation...
, giving free rein to fantasy
Fantasy
Fantasy is a genre of fiction that commonly uses magic and other supernatural phenomena as a primary element of plot, theme, or setting. Many works within the genre take place in imaginary worlds where magic is common...
elements and casting his car and his own dog as heroes. Because of the indeterminacy of their genre affiliation, these last Mirbeau stories show how completely he had broken with the conventions of realist fiction.
Mirbeau's theatre
In the theatre, Mirbeau made his first steps with a proletarian drama and modern tragedy, Les Mauvais bergersLes Mauvais bergers
Les Mauvais Bergers is a modern tragedy, in five acts, by the French journalist, novelist and playwright Octave Mirbeau, performed in December 1897 on the stage of Théâtre de la Renaissance, in Paris, then published by Charpentier-Fasquelle in March 1898...
(The Bad Shepherds, 1897). Then he experienced worldwide acclaim with Les affaires sont les affaires (Business is business
Business is business
Business is business is a French comedy in three acts, by the novelist and playwright Octave Mirbeau, performed in April 1903 on the stage of Comédie-Française, in Paris, and worldwide acclaimed, especially in Russia, Germany and United States....
1903) - his classical comedy of manners
Comedy of manners
The comedy of manners is a genre of play/television/film which satirizes the manners and affectations of a social class, often represented by stock characters, such as the miles gloriosus in ancient times, the fop and the rake during the Restoration, or an old person pretending to be young...
and characters in the tradition of Molière
Molière
Jean-Baptiste Poquelin, known by his stage name Molière, was a French playwright and actor who is considered to be one of the greatest masters of comedy in Western literature...
. Here Mirbeau featured the character of Isidore Lechat, predecessor of the modern master of business intrigue, a product of the new world, a figure who makes money from everything and spreads his tentacles out over the world.
In 1908 - at the end of a long legal and media battle - Mirbeau saw his play Le Foyer (Home) performed by the Comédie-Française
Comédie-Française
The Comédie-Française or Théâtre-Français is one of the few state theaters in France. It is the only state theater to have its own troupe of actors. It is located in the 1st arrondissement of Paris....
. In this work, he broached a new taboo subject, the economic and sexual exploitation of adolescents in a home that pretended to be a charitable one.
He also wrote six one act play
One act play
A one-act play is a play that has only one act, as distinct from plays that occur over several acts. One-act plays may consist of one or more scenes. In recent years the 10-minute play known as "flash drama" has emerged as a popular sub-genre of the one-act play, especially in writing competitions...
s, published under the title of Farces et moralités
Farces et moralités
Farces et moralités is a collection of six comedy plays in one act, written by the French novelist and playwright Octave Mirbeau and published by Fasquelle in 1904: Vieux ménages , L’Épidémie , Les Amants , Scrupules Farces et moralités (Farces and morality plays) is a collection of six comedy...
(1904), among them being L'Épidémie (Epidemics). Here, Mirbeau can be seen as anticipating the theatre of Bertolt Brecht
Bertolt Brecht
Bertolt Brecht was a German poet, playwright, and theatre director.An influential theatre practitioner of the 20th century, Brecht made equally significant contributions to dramaturgy and theatrical production, the latter particularly through the seismic impact of the tours undertaken by the...
, Marcel Aymé
Marcel Aymé
Marcel Aymé was a French novelist, children's writer, humour writer and also a screenwriter and theatre playwright.- Biography :...
, Harold Pinter
Harold Pinter
Harold Pinter, CH, CBE was a Nobel Prize–winning English playwright and screenwriter. One of the most influential modern British dramatists, his writing career spanned more than 50 years. His best-known plays include The Birthday Party , The Homecoming , and Betrayal , each of which he adapted to...
, and Eugène Ionesco
Eugène Ionesco
Eugène Ionesco was a Romanian and French playwright and dramatist, and one of the foremost playwrights of the Theatre of the Absurd...
. He calls language itself into question, demystifying law, ridiculing the discourse of politicians, and making fun of the language of love.
Posthumous fame
Mirbeau has never been forgotten, and there has been no interruption in the publication of his works. Yet his immense literary production has largely been known through only three works, and he was considered as literarily and politically incorrect.But, more recently, Mirbeau has been rediscovered and presented in a new light. A fuller appreciation of the role he played in the political, literary, and artistic world of la Belle Epoque
Belle Époque
The Belle Époque or La Belle Époque was a period in European social history that began during the late 19th century and lasted until World War I. Occurring during the era of the French Third Republic and the German Empire, it was a period characterised by optimism and new technological and medical...
is emerging.
Mirbeau lies buried in the Passy Cemetery
Passy Cemetery
The Passy Cemetery is a famous cemetery located at 2, rue du Commandant Schlœsing in Passy, in the 16th arrondissement of Paris, France.-History:...
, in the XVIe arrondissement
XVIe arrondissement
The 16th arrondissement of Paris is one of the 20 arrondissements of Paris, the capital city of France...
of 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...
.
Novels
- Le CalvaireLe CalvaireLe Calvaire is a novel written by the French journalist, novelist and playwright Octave Mirbeau, and published by Ollendorff in 1886.- Plot summary :...
(1886) (Calvary, New York, 1922). - L'Abbé Jules (1888) (Abbé JulesAbbé JulesL'Abbé Jules is a novel written by the French journalist, novelist and playwright Octave Mirbeau, and published by Ollendorff in 1888.- Plot summary :...
, Sawtry, Dedalus, 1996). - Sébastien RochSébastien RochSébastien Roch is a novel written by the French journalist, novelist and playwright Octave Mirbeau, and published by Charpentier in 1890. Last French edition : L'Age d'Homme, 2011....
(1890) (Sébastien Roch, Sawtry, Dedalus, 2000). - Dans le cielDans le cielDans le ciel is a novel written by the French journalist, novelist and playwright Octave Mirbeau. First published in serialized installments in L’Écho de Paris between September 1892 and May 1893, Dans le ciel, assembled and edited by Pierre Michel and Jean-François Nivet, first appeared its...
(1893–1989) (In the sky, translation to be published). - Le Jardin des supplicesThe Torture Garden (novel)The Torture Garden is a novel written by the French journalist, novelist and playwright Octave Mirbeau and was first published in 1899, during the Dreyfus Affair...
(1899) (Torture Garden, New York, 1931; The Garden of Tortures, London, 1938) . - Le Journal d'une femme de chambre (1900) (A Chambermaid's diary, New York, 1900 ; The Diary of a Lady's Maid, London, 1903 ; Célestine, being the diary of a chambermaid, New York, 1930 ; Diary of a chambermaid, New York, 1945).
- Les Vingt et un Jours d'un neurasthéniqueLes Vingt et un Jours d'un neurasthéniqueLes Vingt et un Jours d'un neurasthénique is an expressionist novel by the French writer Octave Mirbeau, published by Charpentier-Fasquelle in August of 1901.- Commentary :...
(1901). - Dingo (novel)Dingo (novel)-Plot summary:Completed by Mirbeau’s long-time friend Léon Werth, when the author’s ill health prevented him from writing the concluding chapters, Dingo, Mirbeau’s final novel, appeared in completed form with Fasquelle in 1913...
(1913). - Un gentilhomme (1919).
- Les Mémoires de mon ami (1920).
- Œuvre romanesque, 3 volumes, Buchet/Chastel – Société Octave Mirbeau, 2000–2001, 4 000 pages. Website of Éditions du Boucher, 2003-2004.
Théâtre
- Les Mauvais bergersLes Mauvais bergersLes Mauvais Bergers is a modern tragedy, in five acts, by the French journalist, novelist and playwright Octave Mirbeau, performed in December 1897 on the stage of Théâtre de la Renaissance, in Paris, then published by Charpentier-Fasquelle in March 1898...
(The Bad Shepherds) (1897). - Les affaires sont les affaires (1903) (Business is businessBusiness is businessBusiness is business is a French comedy in three acts, by the novelist and playwright Octave Mirbeau, performed in April 1903 on the stage of Comédie-Française, in Paris, and worldwide acclaimed, especially in Russia, Germany and United States....
, New York, 1904). - Farces et moralitésFarces et moralitésFarces et moralités is a collection of six comedy plays in one act, written by the French novelist and playwright Octave Mirbeau and published by Fasquelle in 1904: Vieux ménages , L’Épidémie , Les Amants , Scrupules Farces et moralités (Farces and morality plays) is a collection of six comedy...
, six morality playMorality playThe morality play is a genre of Medieval and early Tudor theatrical entertainment. In their own time, these plays were known as "interludes", a broader term given to dramas with or without a moral theme. Morality plays are a type of allegory in which the protagonist is met by personifications of...
s (1904) (Scruples, New York, 1923 ; The Epidemic, Bloomington, 1949 ; The Lovers, translation coming soon). - Le Foyer (1908) (Charity).
- Dialogues tristes, Eurédit, 2005.
Short stories
- Dans l'antichambre (Histoire d'une Minute) (1905).
- Contes cruels, 2 volumes (1990 and 2000).
- Contes drôles (1995).
- Mémoire pour un avocat (2007).
Art chronicles
- Combats esthétiques, 2 volumes (1993).
- Premières chroniques esthétiques (1995).
- Combats littéraires (2006).
Political and social chronicles
- La Grève des électeurs (1888) (Voters strike).
- Combats politiques (1990).
- L'Affaire Dreyfus (1991).
- Lettres de l'Inde (1991).
- L'Amour de la femme vénale (1994).
- Chroniques du Diable (1995).
Correspondence
- Lettres à Alfred Bansard des Bois (1989)
- (1988), avec Monet (1990), avec Pissarro (1990), avec Jean Grave (1994), avec Jules Huret (2009).
- , 3 volumes already published (2003-2005-2009).