Online Encyclopedia

Search over 40,000 articles from the original, classic Encyclopedia Britannica, 11th Edition.

DUPONT, PIERRE (1821-1870)

Online Encyclopedia
Originally appearing in Volume V08, Page 687 of the 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica.
» Make a correction to this article.
» Add information or comments to this article.
Spread the word: del.icio.us del.icio.us it!

See also:

DUPONT, See also:PIERRE (1821-1870) , See also:French See also:song-writer, the son of a blacksmith, was See also:born at See also:Lyons on the 23rd of See also:April 1821. His parents both died before he was five years old, and he was brought up in the See also:country by his godfather, a See also:village See also:priest. He was educated at the See also:seminary of L'Argentiere, and was afterwards apprenticed to a See also:notary at Lyons. In 1839 he found his way to See also:Paris, and some of his poems were inserted, in the See also:Gazette de See also:France and the Quotidienne. Two years later he was saved from the See also:conscription and enabled to publish his first volume—Les Deux Anges—through the exertions of a kinsman and of Pierre See also:Lebrun. In 1842 he received a See also:prize from the See also:Academy, and worked for some See also:time on the See also:official See also:dictionary. See also:Gounod's appreciation of his See also:peasant song, J'ai deux grands bceufs clans mon etable (1846), settled his vocation as a song-writer. He had no theoretical knowledge of See also:music, but he composed both the words and the melodies of his songs, the two processes being generally simultaneous. He himself remained so See also:innocent of musical know-ledge that he had to engage Ernest See also:Reyer to write down his airs. He sang his own songs, as they were composed, at the workmen's concerts in the Salle de la Fraternite du See also:Faubourg See also:Saint-See also:Denis; the public performance of his famous Le See also:Pain was forbidden; Le See also:Chant See also:des ouvriers was even more popular; and in 1851 he paid the See also:penalty of having become the poet See also:laureate of the socialistic aspirations of the time by being comdemned to seven years of See also:exile from France. The See also:sentence was cancelled, and the poet withdrew for a time from participation in politics. He died at Lyons, where his later years were spent, on the 24th of See also:July 1870.

His songs have appeared in various forms—Chants et chansons (3 vols., with music, 1852-1854), Chants et poesies (7th edition, 1862), &c. Among the best-known are Le Braconnier, Le See also:

Tisserand, La Vache See also:blanche, La Chanson du ble, but many others might be mentioned of equal spontaneity and See also:charm. His later See also:works have not the same merit. See also Sainte-Beuve, Causeries du lundi, iv.; Ch. See also:Baudelaire, See also:Notice sur P. Dupont (1849) ; Dechaut, Biographie de Pierre Dupont (1871); and Ch. Lenient, Poesie patriotique en France (1889), ii. 352 et seq.

End of Article: DUPONT, PIERRE (1821-1870)

Additional information and Comments

There are no comments yet for this article.
» Add information or comments to this article.
Please link directly to this article:
Highlight the code below, right click, and select "copy." Then paste it into your website, email, or other HTML.
Site content, images, and layout Copyright © 2006 - Net Industries, worldwide.
Do not copy, download, transfer, or otherwise replicate the site content in whole or in part.

Links to articles and home page are always encouraged.

[back]
DUPONT DE 		[next]
DUPORT, ADRIEN (1759-1798)

Site © 2006 - Net Industries