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RESTIF, NICOLAS EDME (1734–1806)

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Originally appearing in Volume V23, Page 200 of the 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica.
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RESTIF, See also:NICOLAS EDME (1734–1806) , called RESTIF DE LA BRETONNE, See also:French novelist, son of a See also:farmer, was See also:born at Sacy (See also:Yonne) on the 23rd of See also:October 1734. He was educated by the Jansenists at Bicetre, and on the See also:expulsion of the Jansenists was received by one of his See also:brothers, who was a cure. Owing to a See also:scandal in which he was involved, he was apprenticed to a printer at See also:Auxerre, and, having served his See also:time, went to See also:Paris. Here he worked as a journeyman printer, and in 176o he married See also:Anne or See also:Agnes Lebegue, a relation of his former See also:master at Auxerre. It was not until five or six years after his See also:marriage that Restif appeared as an author, and from that time to his See also:death, on the 2nd of See also:February 18o6, he produced a bewildering multitude of books, amounting to something like two See also:hundred volumes, many of them printed with his own See also:hand, on almost every conceivable variety of subject. Restif suffered at one time or another the extremes of poverty and was acquainted with every See also:kind of intrigue. He See also:drew on the episodes of his own See also:life for his books, which, in spite of their faded sentiment, contain truthful pictures of French society on the See also:eve of the Revolution. The most noteworthy of his See also:works are Le Pied de Fanchette, a novel (1769); Le Pornographe (1769), a See also:plan for regulating See also:prostitution which is said to have been actually carried out by the See also:Emperor See also:Joseph II., while not a few detached hints have been adopted by See also:continental nations; Le Paysan perverti (1775), a novel with a moral purpose, though sufficiently horrible in detail; La See also:Vie de mon pere (1779); See also:Les Contemporaines (42 vols., 1780–1785), a vast collection of See also:short stories; Ingenue Saxancour, also a novel (1785); and, lastly, the extraordinary autobiography of See also:Monsieur Nicolas (16 vols., 1794–1797; the last two are practically a See also:separate and much less interesting See also:work), in which at the See also:age of sixty he has set down his remembrances, his notions on ethical and social points, his hatreds, and above all his numerous loves, real and fancied. The See also:original See also:editions of these, and indeed of all his books, have See also:long been See also:bibliographical curiosities owing to their rarity, the beautiful and curious illustrations which many of them contain, and the See also:quaint typographic See also:system in which most are composed. In 1795 he received a gratuity of 2000 francs from the See also:government, and just before his death See also:Napoleon gave him a See also:place in the See also:ministry of See also:police, which he did not live to take up. Restif de la Bretonne undoubtedly holds a remarkable place in French literature. He was inordinately vain, of extremely relaxed morals, and perhaps not entirely sane.

His books were written with haste, and their See also:

licence of subject and See also:language renders them quite unfit for See also:general perusal. The works of C. Monselet, Retif de la Bretonne (1853), and P. See also:Lacroix, Bibliographie et iconographie (1875), J. Assezat's selection from the Contemporaines, with excellent introductions (3vols.,1875), and the valuable reprint of Monsieur Nicolas (14 vols., 1883-1884), will be sufficient to enable even curious readers to See also:form a See also:judgment of him. His life, written by his contemporary Cubieres-Palmezeaux, was republished in 1875. See also Eugen Duhren, Retif de la Bretonne, der Mensch, der Schriftsteller, der Ref ormator (See also:Berlin, 1906), and a bibliography, Retif-Bibliothek (Berlin, 1906), by the same author.

End of Article: RESTIF, NICOLAS EDME (1734–1806)

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