Stendhal - Love

LOVE

MARIE HENRI BEYLE, known through his writings as Stendhal, was born in Grenoble in 1783 and educated there at the cole Centrale. A cousin offered him a post in the Ministry of War and from 1800 onwards he followed Napoleons campaigns in Italy, Germany, Russia and Austria. In between wars he spent his time in Paris drawing-rooms and theatres.

After the fall of Napoleon he retired to Italy, adopted his pseudonym, and started to write books on Italian painting, Haydn and Mozart, and travels in Italy. In 1821 he left Italy because of the political situation and, returning to Paris, he finished his book De LAmour. This was followed by Racine et Shakespeare, a defence of romantic literature. Le Rouge et le Noir was his second novel, and he also produced or began three others, including La Chartreuse de Parme, none of which was received with any great understanding during his lifetime.

Beyle was appointed Consul at Civitavecchia after the 1830 revolution, but his health deteriorated and six years later he was back in Paris and beginning a life of Napoleon. In 1841 he was once again recalled for reasons of illness, and in the following year he suffered a fatal stroke. Various autobiographical works, his Journal, his Souvenirs dgotisme and his Vie de Henry Brulard were published later.

STENDHAL

Translated by GILBERT and SUZANNE SALE and with an Introduction by
JEAN STEWART and B. C. J. G. KNIGHT

PENGUIN BOOKS

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This translation published by The Merlin Press 1957
Published in Penguin Books 1975
Reprinted with Further Reading 2004
19

Translation copyright The Merlin Press, 1957
Introduction copyright Jean Stewart and B. C. J. G. Knight, 1975
Further Reading copyright Robin Buss, 2004
All rights reserved

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EISBN: 9780141907451

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178399. Marie-Henri Beyle (Stendhal) born 23 January 1783 in Grenoble, son of Chrubin Beyle and his wife Henriette, ne Gagnon, who died in childbed November 1790. Lived in Grenoble, went to Central School, passed examinations for entry to the cole Polytechnique in Paris where he went on 10 November 1799. He did not attend the Polytechnique and lived at first alone and later in the house of his cousin Pierre Daru, who took Stendhal into his offices in the Ministry of War.

1800. Went with the army of Napoleon over the St Bernard Pass into Italy and moved from garrison to garrison in Lombardy and various towns in Northern Italy as aide-de-camp to General Michoud. At end of 1801 obtained leave and returned to France. Began his Journal.

18025. Various occupations and love affairs; interested in the theatre and tried to write a play; much reading, including in particular the Ideology of Destutt de Tracy.

180614. Returned to Paris from Marseille and renewed contact with his cousins Pierre and Martial Daru, important military persons.

Went with Napoleonic armies to Germany, Austria, Hungary.

181011. Held official posts: auditeur to the Council of State, inspector of furniture and buildings of the Crown. Travelled in Italy (Florence, Rome, Naples) and first had the idea of writing an Histoire de la Peinture en Italie.

1812. Went with the headquarters staff of Napoleons army into Russia, entered Moscow, saw it in flames; was sent back to organize provisioning for the retreat from Moscow at Smolensk, Mohilev, Vitebsk.

1813. New post as commissariat officer at Sagan in Silesia. Obtained leave and went to Milan.

1814. At Grenoble appointed assistant to Count de Saint-Vallier, commissioner extraordinary of the 7th military region, to organize resistance to the Allied invasion. Allies entered Paris and Napoleon exiled to Elba. The end of Stendhals fortunes under Napoleon.

Wrote Vies de Haydn, Mozart, et Metastase. Went to Milan, where he spent most of the next seven years.

1815. Stendhal remained in Italy, not returning to France during the Hundred Days when Napoleon came back from Elba; Waterloo, and final exile of Napoleon to St Helena.

1816. Stendhal in Milanese society, attended La Scala in box of Lodovico de Breme, met Byron and other liberals.

1817. Histoire de la Peinture en Italie and Rome, Naples, et Florence published in Paris.

1818. 4 March, beginning of the great musical theme, which was his painful love for Mtilde Viscontini Dembowski, whom he called Mtilde.

1819. Milan, Volterra, Grenoble; deeply in love with Mtilde. 29 December, had the brilliant idea of writing a book which would express all that Mtilde had made him feel. This became De lAmour. The political situation in Milan grew more and more difficult for the liberals.

1820. Journeyed to Northern Italy. In Milan, occupied with his book concerning his feelings for Mtilde, who treated him more and more coolly. Arrests of prominent liberals. Rumours began to spread in liberal circles that Stendhal was an agent of the French Government. First draft of De lAmour sent to France.

1821. The Austrian Government suspected Stendhal of being connected with the Carbonari movement. 13 June, Stendhal finally left Milan on urgent advice from friends and because he recognized the hopelessness of his love for Mtilde, who was even colder towards him.

182130. Lived in Paris, frequented literary circles, wrote for English reviews, and published books.

1822. De lAmour published.

1823. Vie de Rossini and Racine et Shakespeare I published.

1824. Journalism in French and English papers and reviews.

1825. Racine et Shakespeare II; Dun nouveau complot contre les industriels.

1826. Second, much changed edition of Rome, Naples, et Florence. Wrote Armance.

1827. Armance published.

1828. January went to Milan and was immediately expelled.

1829. Published Promenades dans Rome. Various short stories: Vanina Vanini, Le coffre et le revenant appeared in Revue de Paris, Mme de Vanghel (then unpublished).

183031. Wrote story Le Philtre and his great novel Le Rouge et le Noir which was published in November 1830.

1831. After the revolution of July 1830, which overthrew Charles X and established Louis-Philippe and the Charter in France, he eventually obtained the post of French Consul at Trieste; but the Austrian Government would not accept him and he had to leave.