60-506: Alexandre Dumas (born Dumas Davy de la Pailleterie , 24 July 1802 – 5 December 1870), also known as Alexandre Dumas père , was a French novelist and playwright. His works have been translated into many languages and he is one of the most widely read French authors. Many of his historical novels of adventure were originally published as serials , including The Count of Monte Cristo , The Three Musketeers , Twenty Years After and The Vicomte of Bragelonne: Ten Years Later . Since
120-581: A play written by Alexandre Dumas (père), based on the life of Henry III of France . It was the author's first produced play. Its premier performance at the Comédie-Française on 10 February 1829 was attended by the Duke of Orléans , the future king Louis Philippe I . The play was met with great acclaim and is considered an important work in the development of romanticism in French theatre. It
180-485: A New Zealand pharmacist who never visited France, amassed the greatest collection of books and manuscripts relating to Dumas outside France. The collection contains about 3,350 volumes, including some 2,000 sheets in Dumas's handwriting and dozens of French, Belgian and English first editions. The collection was donated to Auckland Libraries after his death. Reed wrote the most comprehensive bibliography of Dumas. In 2002, for
240-435: A combination of the rise of literacy, technological advances in printing, and improved economics of distribution. Most Victorian novels first appeared as instalments in monthly or weekly periodicals. The wild success of Charles Dickens 's The Pickwick Papers , first published in 1836, is widely considered to have established the viability and appeal of the serialised format within periodical literature. During that era,
300-532: A completed volume format. As a piece in Scribner's Monthly explained in 1878, "Now it is the second or third rate novelist who cannot get publication in a magazine, and is obliged to publish in a volume, and it is in the magazine that the best novelist always appears first." Among the American writers who wrote in serial form were Henry James and Herman Melville . A large part of the appeal for writers at
360-472: A day, working on several novels for serialised publication at once. However, not every writer could keep up with the serial writing pace. Wilkie Collins , for instance, was never more than a week before publication. The difference in writing pace and output in large part determined the author's success, as audience appetite created a demand for further instalments. In the German-speaking countries ,
420-559: A gourmet and an expert cook. An abridged version (the Petit Dictionnaire de cuisine , or Small Dictionary of Cuisine ) was published in 1883. He was also known for his travel writing. These books included: French historian Alain Decaux founded the "Société des Amis d'Alexandre Dumas" (The Society of Friends of Alexandre Dumas) in 1971. As of August 2017 its president is Claude Schopp. The purpose in creating this society
480-509: A great deal of money, but he was frequently insolvent, as he spent lavishly on women and sumptuous living. (Scholars have found that he had a total of 40 mistresses.) In 1846, he had built a country house outside Paris at Le Port-Marly , the large Château de Monte-Cristo , with an additional building for his writing studio. It often was filled with strangers and acquaintances who stayed for lengthy visits and took advantage of his generosity. Two years later, faced with financial difficulties, he sold
540-517: A growing base of domestic authors. The rise of the periodicals like Harper's and the Atlantic Monthly grew in symbiotic tandem with American literary talent. The magazines nurtured and provided economic sustainability for writers, while the writers helped grow the periodicals' circulation base. During the late 19th century, those that were considered the best American writers first published their work in serial form and then only later in
600-467: A marriage licence, that his mother's name was "Marie-Cessette Dumas". Some scholars have suggested that Thomas-Alexandre devised the surname "Dumas" for himself when he felt the need for one, and that he attributed it to his mother when convenient. "Dumas" means "of the farm" ( du mas ), perhaps signifying only that Marie-Cessette belonged to the farm property. While working for Louis-Philippe, Alexandre Dumas began writing articles for magazines and plays for
660-513: A period as long as a year, with the authors and periodicals often responding to audience reaction. In France, Alexandre Dumas and Eugène Sue were masters of the serialised genre. The Three Musketeers and The Count of Monte Cristo each appeared as a feuilleton . The Count of Monte Cristo was stretched out to 139 instalments. Eugène Sue's serial novel Le Juif errant increased circulation of Le Constitutionnel from 3,600 to 25,000. Production in book form soon followed and serialisation
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#1732764923431720-501: A previous relationship for "an exorbitant amount" and made Marie-Cessette his concubine . Thomas-Alexandre was the only son born to them, but they had two or three daughters. In 1775, following the death of both his brothers, Antoine left Saint-Domingue for France in order to claim the family estates and the title of Marquis. Shortly before his departure, he sold Marie-Cessette and their two daughters (Adolphe and Jeanette), as well as Marie-Cessette's oldest daughter Marie-Rose (whose father
780-541: A racial identity for Marie-Cessette Dumas refer to her as a " négresse " (a black woman) as opposed to a " mulâtresse " (a woman of visible mixed race). It is unknown whether Marie-Cessette was born in Saint-Domingue or in Africa, nor is it known from which African people her ancestors came. What is known is that, sometime after becoming estranged from his brothers, Antoine purchased Marie-Cessette and her daughter from
840-545: A serial format, for example, Alan Moore's Watchmen . The rise of fan fiction on the internet also follows a serial fiction style of publication, as seen on websites such as FanFiction.Net and Archive of Our Own (AO3) . Aspiring authors have also used the web to publish free-to-read works in serialised format on their own websites as well as web-based communities such as LiveJournal , Fictionpress.com, fictionhub, Kindle Vella and Wattpad . Many of these books receive as many readers as successful novels; some have received
900-405: A single larger work , often a work of narrative fiction , is published in smaller, sequential instalments. The instalments are also known as numbers , parts , fascicules or fascicles , and may be released either as separate publications or within sequential issues of a periodical publication , such as a magazine or newspaper. Serialisation can also begin with a single short story that
960-530: A writer, a career that led to his early success. Decades later, after the election of Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte in 1851, Dumas fell from favour and left France for Belgium, where he stayed for several years. He moved to Russia for a few years and then to Italy. In 1861, he founded and published the newspaper L'Indépendent , which supported Italian unification . He returned to Paris in 1864. English playwright Watts Phillips , who knew Dumas in his later life, described him as "the most generous, large-hearted being in
1020-686: A writer. As newspapers were publishing many serial novels, he began producing these. His first serial novel was La Comtesse de Salisbury ; Édouard III (July-September 1836). In 1838, Dumas rewrote one of his plays as a successful serial historical novel, Le Capitaine Paul ('Captain Paul'), partly based on the life of the Scottish-American naval officer John Paul Jones . He founded a production studio, staffed with writers who turned out hundreds of stories, all subject to his personal direction, editing, and additions. From 1839 to 1841, Dumas, with
1080-676: A year's time in 1894–95 and serialised only after completion, in 1895–96). In addition, works in late Qing dynasty China had been serialised. The Nine-tailed Turtle was serialised from 1906 to 1910. Bizarre Happenings Eyewitnessed over Two Decades was serialised in Xin Xiaoshuo (T: 新小說, S: 新小说, P: Xīn Xiǎoshuō ; W: Hsin Hsiao-shuo ; "New Fiction"), a magazine by Liang Qichao . The first half of Officialdom Unmasked appeared in instalments of Shanghai Shijie Fanhua Bao , serialised there from April 1903 to June 1905. With
1140-411: Is subsequently turned into a series. Historically, such series have been published in periodicals. Popular short-story series are often published together in book form as collections. The growth of moveable type in the 17th century prompted episodic and often disconnected narratives such as L'Astrée and Le Grand Cyrus . At that time, books remained a premium item, so to reduce the price and expand
1200-675: Is written as Grisier's account of how he came to witness the events of the Decembrist revolt in Russia. The novel was eventually banned in Russia by Czar Nicholas I , and Dumas was prohibited from visiting the country until after the Czar's death. Dumas refers to Grisier with great respect in The Count of Monte Cristo , The Corsican Brothers , and in his memoirs. Dumas depended on numerous assistants and collaborators, of whom Auguste Maquet
1260-760: The Duke of Orléans , who ruled as Louis-Philippe , the Citizen King. Until the mid-1830s, life in France remained unsettled, with sporadic riots by disgruntled Republicans and impoverished urban workers seeking change. As life slowly returned to normal, the nation began to industrialise. An improving economy combined with the end of press censorship made the times rewarding for Alexandre Dumas's literary skills. After writing additional successful plays, Dumas switched to writing novels. Although attracted to an extravagant lifestyle and always spending more than he earned, Dumas proved to be an astute marketing strategist as well as
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#17327649234311320-665: The Paris Métro named a station in his honour . His country home outside Paris, the Château de Monte-Cristo , has been restored and is open to the public as a museum. Researchers have continued to find Dumas works in archives, including the five-act play The Gold Thieves , found in 2002 by the scholar Réginald Hamel [ fr ] in the Bibliothèque Nationale de France. It was published in France in 2004 by Honoré-Champion. Frank Wild Reed (1874–1953),
1380-701: The kingdom of Italy was proclaimed, with Victor Emmanuel II as its king. Dumas travelled there and for the next three years participated in the movement for Italian unification . He founded and led a newspaper, Indipendente . While there, he befriended Giuseppe Garibaldi , whom he had long admired and with whom he shared a commitment to liberal republican principles as well as membership within Freemasonry . Returning to Paris in 1864, he published travel books about Italy. Despite Dumas's aristocratic background and personal success, he had to deal with discrimination related to his mixed-race ancestry. In 1843, he wrote
1440-586: The Army and was promoted to general by the age of 31, the first soldier of Afro-Antilles origin to reach that rank in the French army. The family surname ("de la Pailleterie") was never bestowed upon Thomas-Alexandre, who therefore used "Dumas" as his surname. This is often assumed to have been his mother's surname, but in fact, the surname "Dumas" occurs only once in connection with Marie-Cessette, and that happens in Europe, when Thomas-Alexandre states, while applying for
1500-692: The Road in The New York Times Magazine in 2007. The emergence of the World Wide Web prompted some authors to revise a serial format. Stephen King experimented with The Green Mile (1996) and, less successfully, with the uncompleted The Plant in 2000. Michel Faber allowed The Guardian to serialise his novel The Crimson Petal and the White . In 2005, Orson Scott Card serialised his out-of-print novel Hot Sleep in
1560-480: The Sainte-Hermine saga. Schopp combined them to publish the sequel Le Salut de l'Empire in 2008. Alexandre Dumas wrote numerous stories and historical chronicles of adventure. They included the following: In addition, Dumas wrote many series of novels: The d'Artagnan Romances : The Valois were the royal house of France from 1328 to 1589, and many Dumas romances cover their reign. Traditionally,
1620-672: The Vanities , about contemporary New York City, ran in 27 parts in Rolling Stone , partially inspired by the model of Dickens. The magazine paid $ 200,000 for his work, but Wolfe heavily revised the work before publication as a standalone novel. Alexander McCall Smith , author of The No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency series, experimented in 2004 with publishing his novel 44 Scotland Street in instalments every weekday in The Scotsman . Michael Chabon serialised Gentlemen of
1680-619: The assistance of several friends, compiled Celebrated Crimes , an eight-volume collection of essays on famous criminals and crimes from European history. He featured Beatrice Cenci , Martin Guerre , Cesare and Lucrezia Borgia , as well as more recent events and criminals, including the cases of the alleged murderers Karl Ludwig Sand and Antoine François Desrues , who were executed. Dumas collaborated with Augustin Grisier, his fencing master, in his 1840 novel, The Fencing Master . The story
1740-507: The bicentenary of Dumas's birth, French President Jacques Chirac held a ceremony honouring the author by having his ashes re-interred at the mausoleum of the Panthéon , where many French luminaries were buried. When Chirac ordered the transfer to the mausoleum, villagers in Dumas's hometown of Villers-Cotterets were initially opposed, arguing that Dumas laid out in his memoirs that he wanted to be buried there. The village eventually bowed to
1800-441: The daughter of an innkeeper, and Thomas-Alexandre Dumas . Thomas-Alexandre had been born in the French colony of Saint-Domingue (now Haiti), the mixed-race , natural son of the marquis Alexandre Antoine Davy de la Pailleterie (Antoine), a French nobleman and général commissaire in the artillery of the colony, and Marie-Cessette Dumas , an enslaved woman of Afro-Caribbean ancestry. The two extant primary documents that state
1860-547: The early 20th century, his novels have been adapted into nearly 200 films. Prolific in several genres, Dumas began his career by writing plays, which were successfully produced from the first. He wrote numerous magazine articles and travel books; his published works totalled 100,000 pages. In the 1840s, Dumas founded the Théâtre Historique in Paris. His father, General Thomas-Alexandre Dumas Davy de la Pailleterie ,
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1920-399: The entire property. Dumas wrote in a wide variety of genres and published a total of 100,000 pages in his lifetime. He made use of his experience, writing travel books after taking journeys, including those motivated by reasons other than pleasure. Dumas travelled to Spain, Italy, Germany, England and French Algeria . After King Louis-Philippe was ousted in a revolt, Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte
1980-494: The first issue of his online magazine, InterGalactic Medicine Show . In 2008 McCall Smith wrote a serialised online novel Corduroy Mansions , with the audio edition read by Andrew Sachs made available at the same pace as the daily publication. In 2011, pseudonymous author Wildbow published Worm , which remains one of the most popular web serials of all time. Conversely, graphic novels became more popular in this period containing stories that were originally published in
2040-522: The government's decision, and Dumas's body was exhumed from its cemetery and put into a new coffin in preparation for the transfer. The proceedings were televised: the new coffin was draped in a blue velvet cloth and carried on a caisson flanked by four mounted Republican Guards costumed as the four Musketeers . It was transported through Paris to the Panthéon. In his speech, Chirac said: With you, we were D'Artagnan, Monte Cristo, or Balsamo, riding along
2100-715: The line between "quality" and "commercial" literature was not distinct. Other famous writers who wrote serial literature for popular magazines were Wilkie Collins , inventor of the detective novel with The Moonstone ; Anthony Trollope , many of whose novels were published in serial form in Cornhill magazine; and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle , who created the Sherlock Holmes stories originally for serialisation in The Strand magazine. While American periodicals first syndicated British writers, over time they drew from
2160-521: The market, publishers produced large works in lower-cost instalments called fascicles. These had the added attraction of allowing a publisher to gauge the popularity of a work without incurring the expense of a substantial print run of bound volumes: if the work was not a success, no bound volumes needed to be prepared. If, on the other hand, the serialised book sold well, it was a good bet that bound volumes would sell well, too. Serialised fiction surged in popularity during Britain's Victorian era , due to
2220-461: The peak of her success. With Victor Hugo , Charles Baudelaire , Gérard de Nerval , Eugène Delacroix and Honoré de Balzac , Dumas was a member of the Club des Hashischins , which met monthly to take hashish at a hotel in Paris. Dumas's The Count of Monte Cristo contains several references to hashish. On 5 December 1870, Dumas died at the age of 68 of natural causes, possibly a heart attack. He
2280-931: The rise of broadcast—both radio and television series —in the first half of the 20th century, printed periodical fiction began a slow decline as newspapers and magazines shifted their focus from entertainment to information and news. However, some serialisation of novels in periodicals continued, with mixed success. The first several books in the Tales of the City series by Armistead Maupin appeared from 1978 as regular instalments in San Francisco newspapers. Similar serial novels ran in other city newspapers, such as The Serial (1976; Marin County ), Tangled Lives (Boston), Bagtime (Chicago), and Federal Triangle (Washington, D.C.). Starting in 1984, Tom Wolfe 's The Bonfire of
2340-669: The roads of France, touring battlefields, visiting palaces and castles—with you, we dream. Chirac acknowledged the racism that had existed in France and said that the re-interment in the Pantheon had been a way of correcting that wrong, as Alexandre Dumas was enshrined alongside fellow great authors Victor Hugo and Émile Zola . Chirac noted that although France has produced many great writers, none has been so widely read as Dumas. His novels have been translated into nearly 100 languages, and inspired more than 200 motion pictures. In June 2005, Dumas's last novel, The Knight of Sainte-Hermine ,
2400-401: The same number of readers as New York Times best-sellers. In addition, the prevalence of mobile devices made the serial format even more popular with the likes of JukePop Serials, and Serial Box, with iOS and Android apps that focus entirely on curating and promoting serialised novels. Henry III and His Court Henry III and His Court ( French : Henri III et sa cour ) is
2460-507: The scholar Claude Schopp lists nearly 40 mistresses. He is known to have fathered at least four children by them: About 1866, Dumas had an affair with Adah Isaacs Menken , an American actress who was less than half his age and at the height of her career. She had performed her sensational role in Mazeppa in London. In Paris, she had a sold-out run of Les Pirates de la Savanne and was at
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2520-551: The serialised novel was widely popularised by the weekly family magazine Die Gartenlaube , which reached a circulation of 382,000 by 1875. In Russia, The Russian Messenger serialised Leo Tolstoy 's Anna Karenina from 1873 to 1877 and Fyodor Dostoevsky 's The Brothers Karamazov from 1879 to 1880. In Poland, Bolesław Prus wrote several serialised novels: The Outpost (1885–86), The Doll (1887–89), The New Woman (1890–93), and his sole historical novel , Pharaoh (the latter, exceptionally, written entire over
2580-542: The short novel Georges , which addressed some of the issues of race and the effects of colonialism. His response to a man who insulted him about his partial African ancestry has become famous. Dumas said: My father was a mulatto , my grandfather was a Negro, and my great-grandfather a monkey. You see, Sir, my family starts where yours ends. On 1 February 1840, Dumas married actress Ida Ferrier (born Marguerite-Joséphine Ferrand) (1811–1859). They did not have any children together. Dumas had numerous liaisons with other women;
2640-413: The short versions (50 chapters or less) number eight in total: Although best known now as a novelist, Dumas first earned fame as a dramatist. His Henri III et sa cour (1829) was the first of the great Romantic historical dramas produced on the Paris stage, preceding Victor Hugo's more famous Hernani (1830). Produced at the Comédie-Française and starring the famous Mademoiselle Mars , Dumas's play
2700-624: The so-called "Valois Romances" are the three that portray the Reign of Queen Marguerite , the last of the Valois. Dumas, however, later wrote four more novels that cover this family and portray similar characters, starting with François or Francis I , his son Henry II , and Marguerite and François II , sons of Henry II and Catherine de' Medici . The Marie Antoinette romances comprise eight novels. The unabridged versions (normally 100 chapters or more) comprise only five books (numbers 1, 3, 4, 7 and 8);
2760-505: The theatre. As an adult, he used the surname of Dumas, as his father had done as an adult. His first play, Henry III and His Court , produced in 1829 when he was 27 years old, met with acclaim. The next year, his second play, Christine , was equally popular. These successes gave him sufficient income to write full-time. In 1830, Dumas participated in the Revolution that ousted Charles X and replaced him with Dumas's former employer,
2820-453: The time was the broad audiences that serialisation could reach, which would then grow their following for published works. One of the first significant American works to be released in serial format is Uncle Tom's Cabin , by Harriet Beecher Stowe , which was published over a 40-week period by The National Era , an abolitionist periodical, starting with the June 5, 1851 issue. Serialisation
2880-489: The unfinished work. It took him years to research it, edit the completed portions, and decide how to treat the unfinished part. Schopp finally wrote the final two-and-a-half chapters, based on the author's notes, to complete the story. Published by Éditions Phébus , it sold 60,000 copies, making it a best seller. Translated into English, it was released in 2006 as The Last Cavalier, and has been translated into other languages. Schopp has since found additional material related to
2940-656: The world. He also was the most delightfully amusing and egotistical creature on the face of the earth. His tongue was like a windmill – once set in motion, you would never know when he would stop, especially if the theme was himself." Dumas Davy de la Pailleterie (later known as Alexandre Dumas) was born in 1802 in Villers-Cotterêts in the department of Aisne , in Picardy , France. He had two older sisters, Marie-Alexandrine (born 1794) and Louise-Alexandrine (1796–1797). Their parents were Marie-Louise Élisabeth Labouret,
3000-523: Was a different man) to a baron who had recently come from Nantes to settle in Saint Domingue. Antoine however retained ownership of Thomas-Alexandre (his only natural son) and took the boy with him to France. There, Thomas-Alexandre received his freedom and a sparse education at a military school, adequate to enable him to join the French army, there being no question of the mixed-race boy being accepted as his father's heir. Thomas-Alexandre did well in
3060-537: Was an enormous success and launched him on his career. It had 50 performances over the next year, extraordinary at the time. Dumas's works included: Dumas wrote many plays and adapted several of his novels as dramas. In the 1840s, he founded the Théâtre Historique , located on the Boulevard du Temple in Paris. The building was used after 1852 by the Opéra National (established by Adolphe Adam in 1847). It
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#17327649234313120-426: Was born in the French colony of Saint-Domingue (present-day Haiti ) to Alexandre Antoine Davy de la Pailleterie, a French nobleman, and Marie-Cessette Dumas , an African slave. At age 14, Thomas-Alexandre was taken by his father to France, where he was educated in a military academy and entered the military for what became an illustrious career. Alexandre acquired work with Louis-Philippe, Duke of Orléans , then as
3180-476: Was buried at his birthplace of Villers-Cotterêts in the department of Aisne. His death was overshadowed by the Franco-Prussian War . Changing literary fashions decreased his popularity. In the late 20th century, scholars such as Reginald Hamel and Claude Schopp have caused a critical reappraisal and new appreciation of his art, as well as finding lost works. In 1970, upon the centenary of his death,
3240-444: Was elected president. As Bonaparte disapproved of the author, Dumas fled in 1851 to Brussels, Belgium, which was also an effort to escape his creditors. In about 1859, he moved to Russia , where French was the second language of the elite and his writings were enormously popular. Dumas spent two years in Russia and visited St. Petersburg, Moscow, Kazan, Astrakhan, Baku, and Tbilisi. He published travel books about Russia. In March 1861,
3300-463: Was one of the main reasons that nineteenth-century novels were so long. Authors and publishers kept the story going if it was successful since authors were paid by line and by episode. Gustave Flaubert 's Madame Bovary was serialised in La Revue de Paris in 1856. Some writers were prolific. Alexandre Dumas wrote at an incredible pace, oftentimes writing with his partner twelve to fourteen hours
3360-470: Was published in France featuring the Battle of Trafalgar . Dumas described a fictional character killing Lord Nelson (Nelson was shot and killed by an unknown sniper). Writing and publishing the novel serially in 1869, Dumas had nearly finished it before his death. It was the third part of the Sainte-Hermine trilogy. Claude Schopp, a Dumas scholar, noticed a letter in an archive in 1990 that led him to discover
3420-480: Was renamed the Théâtre Lyrique in 1851. Dumas was a prolific writer of nonfiction. He wrote journal articles on politics and culture and books on French history. His lengthy Grand Dictionnaire de cuisine ( Great Dictionary of Cuisine ) was published posthumously in 1873, and several editions of it are still in print today. A combination of encyclopaedia and cookbook, it reflects Dumas's interests as both
3480-410: Was so standard in American literature that authors from that era often built instalment structure into their creative process. James, for example, often had his works divided into multi-part segments of similar length. The consumption of fiction during that time was different than in the 20th century. Instead of being read in a single volume, a novel would often be consumed by readers in instalments over
3540-564: Was the best known. It was not until the late twentieth century that his role was fully understood. Dumas wrote the short novel Georges (1843), which uses ideas and plots later repeated in The Count of Monte Cristo . Maquet took Dumas to court to try to get authorial recognition and a higher rate of payment for his work. He was successful in getting more money, but not a by-line. Dumas's novels were so popular that they were soon translated into English and other languages. His writing earned him
3600-540: Was to preserve the Château de Monte-Cristo , where the society is currently located. The other objectives of the Society are to bring together fans of Dumas, to develop cultural activities of the Château de Monte-Cristo, and to collect books, manuscripts, autographs and other materials on Dumas. [REDACTED] Category Serial (literature) In literature , a serial is a printing or publishing format by which
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