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NODIER, CHARLES (1780-1844)

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Originally appearing in Volume V19, Page 731 of the 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica.
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NODIER, See also:CHARLES (1780-1844) , See also:French author, was See also:born on the 29th of See also:April 1780 at See also:Besancon. His See also:father, on the out-break of the Revolution, was appointed See also:mayor of Besancon and consequently See also:chief See also:police See also:magistrate; he seems to have rather See also:lent himself as an See also:instrument to the tyranny of the See also:Jacobins than to have shared their principles; but his son was for a See also:time an ardent See also:citizen, and is said to have been a See also:club member when he could at the most have been twelve years old. In 1793 Charlessaved the See also:life of a See also:lady guilty of sending See also:money to an emigre, by declaring to his father that if she were condemned he would take his own life. He was sent to See also:Strassburg, where he lived in the See also:house of Eulogius See also:Schneider, the notorious Jacobin See also:governor of See also:Alsace, but a See also:good See also:Greek See also:scholar. During the Terror his father put him under the care of Girod de Chautrans, with whom he studied See also:English and See also:German. His love of books began very See also:early, and he combined with it a strong See also:interest in natural See also:science. He became librarian in his native See also:town, but his exertions in the cause of suspected persons brought him under suspicion. An inspection of his papers by the police, however, revealed nothing more dangerous than a dissertation on the antennae of See also:insects. See also:Entomology continued to be a favourite study with him, but he varied it with See also:philology and pure literature and even See also:political See also:writing. For a skit on See also:Napoleon, in 1803, he was imprisoned for some months. He then quitted See also:Paris, whither he had gone after losing his position at Besancon, and for some years lived a very unsettled life at Besancon, See also:Dole, where he married, and in other places in the See also:Jura. During these wanderings he wrote Le Peintre de Salzbourg, See also:journal See also:des emotions d'un cceur souffrant, suivi des Meditations du doitre (1803).

The See also:

hero, Charles, who is a variation of the Werther type, desires the restoration of the monasteries, to afford a See also:refuge from the woes of the See also:world. In 1811 Nodier appears at See also:Laibach as editor of a polyglot journal, the Illyrian See also:Telegraph, published in French, German, See also:Italian and Slay. On the evacuation of the Illyrian provinces he returned to Paris, and the restoration found him a royalist, though he retained something of republican sentiment. In 1824 he was appointed to the librarianship of the Bibliotheque de 1'See also:Arsenal. He was elected a member of the See also:Academy in 1833, and made a member of the See also:Legion of See also:Honour in 1843, a See also:year before his See also:death on the 27th of See also:January 1844. These twenty years at the arsenal were by far the most important and fruitful of Nodier's life. He had much of the Bohemian in his See also:composition. But he had the See also:advantage of a settled See also:home in which to collect and study rare books; and he was able to See also:supply a centre and rallying See also:place to a See also:knot of See also:young See also:literary men of greater individual See also:talent than himself—the so-called Romanticists of 183o—and to See also:colour their tastes and See also:work very decidedly with his own predilections. See also:Victor See also:Hugo, See also:Alfred de. See also:Musset and Sainte-Beuve all acknowledged their obligations to him. He was a passionate admirer of See also:Goethe and of See also:Shakespeare, and had himself contributed to the See also:personal literature that was one of the leading traits of the Romantic school. His best and most characteristic work, some of which is exquisite in its See also:kind, consists partly of See also:short tales of a more or less fantastic See also:character, partly of nondescript articles, See also:half bibliographic, half narrative, the nearest analogue to which in English is to be found in some of the papers of De Quincey.

The best examples of the latter are to be found in the See also:

volume entitled Melanges tires d'une petite bibliotheque, published in 1829 and afterwards continued. Of his tales the best are Smarra, ou See also:les demons de la nuit (1821); Trilby, ou le lutin d'Argail (1822) ; Histoire du roi de Boheme et de ses See also:Sept chdteaux (183o) ; La See also:Fee aux miettes (1832); Ines de See also:las Sierras (1838); Legende se Steur Beatrix (1838), together with some See also:fairy stories published in the year of his death, and Franciscus Columna, which appeared after it. The Souvenirs de jeunesse (1832) are interesting but untrustworthy, and the Dictionnaire universel de la longue francaise (1823), which, in the days before Littr6, was one of the most useful of its kind, is said to have been not wholly or mainly Nodier's. There is a so-called collection of Euvres completes, in 12 vols. (1832), but at that time much of the author's best work had not appeared, and it included but a See also:part of what was actually published. Nodier found an indulgent biographer in Prosper M6rim6e on the occasion of the younger See also:man's See also:admission to the academy. An See also:account of his See also:share in the Romantic See also:movement is to be found in Georg See also:Brandes's See also:Main Currents in Nineteenth See also:Century Literature. His Description raisonnee d'une jolie collection de livres (1844), which is a See also:catalogue of the books in his library, contains a life by See also:Francis Wey and a See also:complete bibliography of his numerous See also:works. See also Sainte-Beuve, Portraits litteraires, vol. ii.; Prosper M6rim6e, Portraits historigues et litteraires (1874); and A. Estignard, Correspondance inedite de Charles Nodier, 1996–1844 (1876), containing his letters to Charles See also:Weiss.

End of Article: NODIER, CHARLES (1780-1844)

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