Paul Féval, père
Encyclopedia
Paul Henri Corentin Féval, père (30 September 1816 - 8 March 1887) was a French novelist and dramatist.
He was the author of popular swashbuckler
novels such as Le Loup Blanc (1843) and the perennial best-seller Le Bossu
(1857). He also penned the seminal vampire fiction
novels Le Chevalier Ténèbre (1860), La Vampire (1865) and La Ville Vampire (1874) and wrote several celebrated novels about his native Brittany
and Mont Saint-Michel
such as La Fée des Grèves (1850).
Féval's greatest claim to fame, however, is as one of the fathers of modern crime fiction
. Because of its themes and characters, his novel Jean Diable (1862) can claim to be the world's first modern novel of detective fiction
. His masterpiece was Les Habits Noirs
(1863–1875), a criminal saga comprising eleven novels.
After losing his fortune in a financial scandal, Féval became a born-again Christian, stopped writing crime thrillers, and began to write religious novels, leaving the tale of the Habits Noirs uncompleted.
in Rennes
in Brittany on 29 September 1816. A number of his novels deals with the history of his native province. He was educated for the bar and became a full-fledged lawyer in 1836. However, he soon moved to Paris, where he gained a footing by the publication of his novel Le Club des phoques (1841) in the Revue de Paris
. It was soon followed by two more swashbucklers: Rollan Pied de Fer (1842), Les Chevaliers du Firmament and Le Loup Blanc (both 1843). The latter novel features a heroic albino who fights for justice in a Zorro
-like disguise, one of the earliest treatments of a crimefighter with a secret identity
.
Féval's break came with the Les Mystères de Londres (1844), a sprawling feuilleton
written to cash in on the success of Eugène Sue
's Les Mystères de Paris. In it, Irishman Fergus O'Breane tries to avenge the wrongs of his countrymen by seeking the annihilation of England. The plot anticipates that of Alexandre Dumas, père
's The Count of Monte Cristo
by one year. The novel also features a Mafia
-like criminal secret society
called the Gentlemen of the Night, a theme that will become recurrent in Féval's oeuvre.
With Les Mystères de Londres, Féval became the equal of Dumas and Sue in the eyes of his contemporaries. However, he was unhappy about his success as the author of adventure novel
s and soon tried to gain literary recognition with social satires such as Le Tueur de Tigres (1853), but in vain. He returned to popular literature with more swashbuckklers such as La Louve (1855) (a sequel to his earlier Le Loup Blanc) and L'Homme de Fer (1856).
His biggest success in the genre was Le Bossu (1857) in which a prodigious swordsman, Henri de Lagardère, disguises himself as a hunchback to avenge his friend the Duke de Nevers, murdered by the villainous Prince de Gonzague. It features the famous motto: If you don't come to Lagardère, Lagardère will come to you. Le Bossu has been the subject of half-a-dozen feature film adaptations and a number of sequels, written by Féval's son.
That same year, with Les Compagnons du Silence, Féval returned to the theme of criminal conspiracies. It was followed by Jean Diable (1862), arguably the first modern crime thriller. In it, Scotland Yard
Chief Superintendent Gregory Temple is mystified by the actions of a supremely gifted crime leader who hides behind the identity of John Devil.
In 1862, Féval founded the magazine Jean Diable, named after his eponymous novel. One of its editors was Émile Gaboriau
, future creator of the police detective Monsieur Lecoq
, a hero seemingly unrelated to the villainous Lecoq of the Habits Noirs first introduced by Féval. Gaboriau's Lecoq later influenced Conan Doyle
's creation of Sherlock Holmes
.
In 1863, Féval embarked on his masterpiece, Les Habits Noirs
, a sprawling criminal saga written over a twelve-year period, comprising seven novels. He retroactively incorporated Les Mystères de Londres, Les Compagnons du Silence (itself a sequel to an earlier work, Bel Demonio (1850)) and Jean Diable into the chronology of Les Habits Noirs, creating a veritable human comedy of evil and secret conspiracies. By its methods, themes and characters, Les Habits Noirs is the precursor of today's conspiracy and organized crime novels. Féval's heroes, from Gregory Temple, the first detective, to Remy d'Arx, the investigative magistrate who pursues the Habits Noirs, are also the first modern heroes of their kind.
In 1865, Féval became President of the Société des Gens de Lettre (Society of Authors), a position he kept until 1868. He was President again from 1874 to 1876.
In 1865, Féval also wrote La Vampire, a seminal text featuring the perversely charismatic Countess Addhema, the first and foremost prototype of the female vampire-as-libido-run-wild theme. Some scholars claimed the text was initially penned in 1856, over 40 years before Bram Stoker
's Dracula
.
Féval returned to the theme of vampirism with La Ville Vampire (1867) the ultimate literary ancestor of Buffy the Vampire Slayer in which the protagonist is Gothic novel writer Ann Radcliffe
herself. In it, to save her friends from the dreaded vampire lord Otto Goetzi, Radcliffe and her fearless vampire hunting companions, Merry Bones the Irishman, Grey Jack the faithful old servant, the revenge-driven Doctor Magnus Szegeli, and Polly Bird, one of the vampire's earlier victims, mount an expedition to find the legendary vampire city of Selene.
In 1873 and 1875, Féval tried to join the Académie française
but was rejected, because of the popular nature of his works, but also because of his political convictions.
In 1875, a few months after finishing La Bande Cadet, the seventh volume in the Habits Noirs series, Féval lost nearly all his fortune–the staggering sum of 800,000 francs–several million dollars by today's reckoning–in a financial scandal linked to the Ottoman Empire
. As a result, he became what today would be called a born-again Christian, and stopped writing crime novels, which he then considered sinful. In fact, he reclaimed the rights to his earlier books and tried to rewrite them to better conform to his new principles. He also began writing religious-themed novels such as La Première Aventure de Corentin Quimper (1876) and Pierre Blot (1877).
In 1882, Paul Féval was again ruined, the victim of an embezzler. He became paralyzed and unable to write. In April 1884, he suffered another blow when he lost his wife. He was taken to the hospice of the Brothers of Saint-Jean de Dieu where he died on 8 March 1887.
His son, Paul Féval, fils
(1860–1933) also became a prolific writer.
He was the author of popular swashbuckler
Swashbuckler
Swashbuckler or swasher is a term that emerged in the 16th century and has been used for rough, noisy and boastful swordsmen ever since. A possible explanation for this term is that it derives from a fighting style using a side-sword with a buckler in the off-hand, which was applied with much...
novels such as Le Loup Blanc (1843) and the perennial best-seller Le Bossu
Le Bossu (novel)
Le Bossu is a French historical adventure novel by Paul Féval, first published in serial parts in Paris in 1858.Loosely based around real events, the story is set in France in two distinct periods, 1699 and 1717, and incorporates real historical characters such as Philippe II, Duke of...
(1857). He also penned the seminal vampire fiction
Vampire fiction
Vampire literature covers the spectrum of literary work concerned principally with the subject of vampires. The literary vampire first appeared in 18th century poetry, before becoming one of the stock figures of gothic fiction with the publication of Polidori's The Vampyre , which was inspired by...
novels Le Chevalier Ténèbre (1860), La Vampire (1865) and La Ville Vampire (1874) and wrote several celebrated novels about his native Brittany
Brittany
Brittany is a cultural and administrative region in the north-west of France. Previously a kingdom and then a duchy, Brittany was united to the Kingdom of France in 1532 as a province. Brittany has also been referred to as Less, Lesser or Little Britain...
and Mont Saint-Michel
Mont Saint-Michel
Mont Saint-Michel is a rocky tidal island and a commune in Normandy, France. It is located approximately one kilometre off the country's north-western coast, at the mouth of the Couesnon River near Avranches...
such as La Fée des Grèves (1850).
Féval's greatest claim to fame, however, is as one of the fathers of modern crime fiction
Crime fiction
Crime fiction is the literary genre that fictionalizes crimes, their detection, criminals and their motives. It is usually distinguished from mainstream fiction and other genres such as science fiction or historical fiction, but boundaries can be, and indeed are, blurred...
. Because of its themes and characters, his novel Jean Diable (1862) can claim to be the world's first modern novel of detective fiction
Detective fiction
Detective fiction is a sub-genre of crime fiction and mystery fiction in which an investigator , either professional or amateur, investigates a crime, often murder.-In ancient literature:...
. His masterpiece was Les Habits Noirs
Les Habits Noirs
thumb|250px|Cover for a French edition of Les Habits Noirs.Les Habits Noirs is a book series written over a thirty-year period, comprising eleven novels, created by Paul Féval, père, a 19th-century French writer....
(1863–1875), a criminal saga comprising eleven novels.
After losing his fortune in a financial scandal, Féval became a born-again Christian, stopped writing crime thrillers, and began to write religious novels, leaving the tale of the Habits Noirs uncompleted.
Life
Paul Henri Corentin Féval was born at the Hôtel de BlossacHôtel de Blossac
The Hôtel de Blossac is an 18th century in the historic center of Rennes, Brittany.Made of two main wings, the building was built in 1728 after the 1720 Rennes city fire, supposedly on a drawing by Jacques Gabriel...
in Rennes
Rennes
Rennes is a city in the east of Brittany in northwestern France. Rennes is the capital of the region of Brittany, as well as the Ille-et-Vilaine department.-History:...
in Brittany on 29 September 1816. A number of his novels deals with the history of his native province. He was educated for the bar and became a full-fledged lawyer in 1836. However, he soon moved to Paris, where he gained a footing by the publication of his novel Le Club des phoques (1841) in the Revue de Paris
Revue de Paris
Revue de Paris was a French literary magazine founded in 1829 by Louis Desiré Veron....
. It was soon followed by two more swashbucklers: Rollan Pied de Fer (1842), Les Chevaliers du Firmament and Le Loup Blanc (both 1843). The latter novel features a heroic albino who fights for justice in a Zorro
Zorro
Zorro is a fictional character created in 1919 by New York-based pulp writer Johnston McCulley. The character has been featured in numerous books, films, television series, and other media....
-like disguise, one of the earliest treatments of a crimefighter with a secret identity
Secret identity
A secret identity is an element of fiction wherein a character develops a separate persona , while keeping their true identity hidden. The character also may wear a disguise...
.
Féval's break came with the Les Mystères de Londres (1844), a sprawling feuilleton
Feuilleton
Feuilleton was originally a kind of supplement attached to the political portion of French newspapers, consisting chiefly of non-political news and gossip, literature and art criticism, a chronicle of the latest fashions, and epigrams, charades and other literary trifles...
written to cash in on the success of Eugène Sue
Eugène Sue
Joseph Marie Eugène Sue was a French novelist.He was born in Paris, the son of a distinguished surgeon in Napoleon's army, and is said to have had the Empress Joséphine for godmother. Sue himself acted as surgeon both in the Spanish campaign undertaken by France in 1823 and at the Battle of Navarino...
's Les Mystères de Paris. In it, Irishman Fergus O'Breane tries to avenge the wrongs of his countrymen by seeking the annihilation of England. The plot anticipates that of Alexandre Dumas, père
Alexandre Dumas, père
Alexandre Dumas, , born Dumas Davy de la Pailleterie was a French writer, best known for his historical novels of high adventure which have made him one of the most widely read French authors in the world...
's The Count of Monte Cristo
The Count of Monte Cristo
The Count of Monte Cristo is an adventure novel by Alexandre Dumas. It is often considered to be, along with The Three Musketeers, Dumas's most popular work. He completed the work in 1844...
by one year. The novel also features a Mafia
Mafia
The Mafia is a criminal syndicate that emerged in the mid-nineteenth century in Sicily, Italy. It is a loose association of criminal groups that share a common organizational structure and code of conduct, and whose common enterprise is protection racketeering...
-like criminal secret society
Secret society
A secret society is a club or organization whose activities and inner functioning are concealed from non-members. The society may or may not attempt to conceal its existence. The term usually excludes covert groups, such as intelligence agencies or guerrilla insurgencies, which hide their...
called the Gentlemen of the Night, a theme that will become recurrent in Féval's oeuvre.
With Les Mystères de Londres, Féval became the equal of Dumas and Sue in the eyes of his contemporaries. However, he was unhappy about his success as the author of adventure novel
Adventure novel
The adventure novel is a genre of novels that has adventure, an exciting undertaking involving risk and physical danger, as its main theme.-History:...
s and soon tried to gain literary recognition with social satires such as Le Tueur de Tigres (1853), but in vain. He returned to popular literature with more swashbuckklers such as La Louve (1855) (a sequel to his earlier Le Loup Blanc) and L'Homme de Fer (1856).
His biggest success in the genre was Le Bossu (1857) in which a prodigious swordsman, Henri de Lagardère, disguises himself as a hunchback to avenge his friend the Duke de Nevers, murdered by the villainous Prince de Gonzague. It features the famous motto: If you don't come to Lagardère, Lagardère will come to you. Le Bossu has been the subject of half-a-dozen feature film adaptations and a number of sequels, written by Féval's son.
That same year, with Les Compagnons du Silence, Féval returned to the theme of criminal conspiracies. It was followed by Jean Diable (1862), arguably the first modern crime thriller. In it, Scotland Yard
Scotland Yard
Scotland Yard is a metonym for the headquarters of the Metropolitan Police Service of London, UK. It derives from the location of the original Metropolitan Police headquarters at 4 Whitehall Place, which had a rear entrance on a street called Great Scotland Yard. The Scotland Yard entrance became...
Chief Superintendent Gregory Temple is mystified by the actions of a supremely gifted crime leader who hides behind the identity of John Devil.
In 1862, Féval founded the magazine Jean Diable, named after his eponymous novel. One of its editors was Émile Gaboriau
Émile Gaboriau
Émile Gaboriau , was a French writer, novelist, and journalist, and a pioneer of modern detective fiction.- Life :Gaboriau was born in the small town of Saujon, Charente-Maritime...
, future creator of the police detective Monsieur Lecoq
Monsieur Lecoq
Monsieur Lecoq is the creation of Émile Gaboriau, a 19th-century French writer and journalist. Monsieur Lecoq is a fictional detective employed by the French Sûreté...
, a hero seemingly unrelated to the villainous Lecoq of the Habits Noirs first introduced by Féval. Gaboriau's Lecoq later influenced Conan Doyle
Conan Doyle
Conan Doyle is a rugby player. His club is Garryowen. His usual position is inside centre, but he also plays out-half. He has made two appearances for Munster Rugby in the Magners League, but was released by Munster at the end of the 2008/2009 season. While at Munster he was selected for the...
's creation of Sherlock Holmes
Sherlock Holmes
Sherlock Holmes is a fictional detective created by Scottish author and physician Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. The fantastic London-based "consulting detective", Holmes is famous for his astute logical reasoning, his ability to take almost any disguise, and his use of forensic science skills to solve...
.
In 1863, Féval embarked on his masterpiece, Les Habits Noirs
Les Habits Noirs
thumb|250px|Cover for a French edition of Les Habits Noirs.Les Habits Noirs is a book series written over a thirty-year period, comprising eleven novels, created by Paul Féval, père, a 19th-century French writer....
, a sprawling criminal saga written over a twelve-year period, comprising seven novels. He retroactively incorporated Les Mystères de Londres, Les Compagnons du Silence (itself a sequel to an earlier work, Bel Demonio (1850)) and Jean Diable into the chronology of Les Habits Noirs, creating a veritable human comedy of evil and secret conspiracies. By its methods, themes and characters, Les Habits Noirs is the precursor of today's conspiracy and organized crime novels. Féval's heroes, from Gregory Temple, the first detective, to Remy d'Arx, the investigative magistrate who pursues the Habits Noirs, are also the first modern heroes of their kind.
In 1865, Féval became President of the Société des Gens de Lettre (Society of Authors), a position he kept until 1868. He was President again from 1874 to 1876.
In 1865, Féval also wrote La Vampire, a seminal text featuring the perversely charismatic Countess Addhema, the first and foremost prototype of the female vampire-as-libido-run-wild theme. Some scholars claimed the text was initially penned in 1856, over 40 years before Bram Stoker
Bram Stoker
Abraham "Bram" Stoker was an Irish novelist and short story writer, best known today for his 1897 Gothic novel Dracula...
's Dracula
Dracula
Dracula is an 1897 novel by Irish author Bram Stoker.Famous for introducing the character of the vampire Count Dracula, the novel tells the story of Dracula's attempt to relocate from Transylvania to England, and the battle between Dracula and a small group of men and women led by Professor...
.
Féval returned to the theme of vampirism with La Ville Vampire (1867) the ultimate literary ancestor of Buffy the Vampire Slayer in which the protagonist is Gothic novel writer Ann Radcliffe
Ann Radcliffe
Anne Radcliffe was an English author, and considered the pioneer of the gothic novel . Her style is romantic in its vivid descriptions of landscapes, and long travel scenes, yet the Gothic element is obvious through her use of the supernatural...
herself. In it, to save her friends from the dreaded vampire lord Otto Goetzi, Radcliffe and her fearless vampire hunting companions, Merry Bones the Irishman, Grey Jack the faithful old servant, the revenge-driven Doctor Magnus Szegeli, and Polly Bird, one of the vampire's earlier victims, mount an expedition to find the legendary vampire city of Selene.
In 1873 and 1875, Féval tried to join 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,...
but was rejected, because of the popular nature of his works, but also because of his political convictions.
In 1875, a few months after finishing La Bande Cadet, the seventh volume in the Habits Noirs series, Féval lost nearly all his fortune–the staggering sum of 800,000 francs–several million dollars by today's reckoning–in a financial scandal linked to the Ottoman Empire
Ottoman Empire
The Ottoman EmpireIt was usually referred to as the "Ottoman Empire", the "Turkish Empire", the "Ottoman Caliphate" or more commonly "Turkey" by its contemporaries...
. As a result, he became what today would be called a born-again Christian, and stopped writing crime novels, which he then considered sinful. In fact, he reclaimed the rights to his earlier books and tried to rewrite them to better conform to his new principles. He also began writing religious-themed novels such as La Première Aventure de Corentin Quimper (1876) and Pierre Blot (1877).
In 1882, Paul Féval was again ruined, the victim of an embezzler. He became paralyzed and unable to write. In April 1884, he suffered another blow when he lost his wife. He was taken to the hospice of the Brothers of Saint-Jean de Dieu where he died on 8 March 1887.
His son, Paul Féval, fils
Paul Féval, fils
Paul Auguste Jean Nicolas Féval was a French adventure novelist, like his father Paul Féval, père...
(1860–1933) also became a prolific writer.
Selected bibliography
- Les Mystères de Londres (Gentlemen of the Night, stage play adaptation, 1848) ISBN 1932983813
- Le Livre des Mystères (Revenants, 1852) ISBN 1932983708
- Le Bossu (The Hunchback, 1958)), many times filmed.
- Le Chevalier Ténèbre (Knightshade, 1860) ISBN 0974071145
- Jean Diable (John Devil, 1861) ISBN 1932983155
- La Fille du Juif Errant (The Wandering Jew's Daughter, 1863) ISBN 1932983309
- Les Habits Noirs (The Black Coats: The Parisian Jungle, 1863) ISBN 978-1-934543-03-0
- Le Capitaine Fantôme (stage play adaptation, 1864) ISBN 1932983813
- Les Habits Noirs: Coeur d Acier (The Black Coats: Heart of Steel, 1865) ISBN 978-1-935558-05-7
- La Vampire (The Vampire Countess, 1865) ISBN 0974071153
- Les Habits Noirs: La Rue de Jérusalem (The Black Coats: Salem Street, 1868) ISBN 1932983465
- Les Habits Noirs: L'Arme Invisible (The Black Coats: The Invisible Weapon, 1869) ISBN 1932983805
- Les Habits Noirs: Les Companions du Trésor (The Black Coats: The Companions of the Treasure, 1872) ISBN 9781934543269
- Les Habits Noirs: La Bande Cadet (The Black Coats: The Cadet Gang, 1875) ISBN 971-935558453
- La Ville Vampire (Vampire City, 1874) ISBN 0974071161
External links
- Works by Paul Féval at Project GutenbergProject GutenbergProject Gutenberg is a volunteer effort to digitize and archive cultural works, to "encourage the creation and distribution of eBooks". Founded in 1971 by Michael S. Hart, it is the oldest digital library. Most of the items in its collection are the full texts of public domain books...