Stendhal

(1783-1842) (Henri Beyle)

   writer

   Stendhal (the pseudonym of Henri Beyle), whose works reflect the turbulent era and extreme individualism of the author, was born in Grenoble. After a rebellious adolescence during which he declared himself an atheist and a Jacobin, Stendhal developed an interest in the works of the philosophers and of the romantics. While serving as an officer in the army of napoléon i, he became fascinated by Italian culture. He then edited his Journal (later published 1881-1935) to reflect his views. Settling in Milan, Italy, (1814-1821), he wrote an essay entitled Rome, Naples, et Florence (1817, signed with the name Stendhal). After a stay in Germany, he returned to Paris, where he was well received in worldly Parisian society and published De l'amour (1822) and a manifesto for liberal literary romanticism (Racine et Shakespeare, 1823, 1825) and two novels, Armance (1827) and his famous Le Rouge et le Noir (1830). Hampered, however, by his relative poverty and limited literary success, he returned to Italy (serving as consul in Trieste, then Civitavecchia, from 1830 to 1842). In 1834, he began Lucien Leuwen (unfinished, 1855) and, from 1836 to 1839, he stayed in Paris and published Les Mémoires d'un tourist (1838), then La Chartreuse de Parme (1839) and L'Abbesse de Castro (1939), a collection of short stories that would become the Chroniques italiennes (posthumous, 1855), accounts in which he presents his "cult of the self." Before returning to Italy, he wrote Lamiel (1842), an unfinished novel in which all his aspirations are expressed through a fascinating female character. After his death, besides his Journal, were published Vie de Renry Bru-lard (reminiscences of his childhood and adolescence, 1890) and Souvenirs d'égoïsme (1821-30, published 1892). Developing a theory that he called "beylism" (a combination of knowledge and a method of living that bases mental experiences in sensations), Stendhal believed that he would actually not be understood until the 20th century. Nonetheless, his writings, style, and literary concepts have had a great effect, influencing such writers as marcel proust, andré gide, and albert camus, as well as the German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche.