Hégésippe Moreau

Moreau was born and died in Paris. In his infancy, his parents, who were poor, migrated to Provins. His father, Claude-François Moreau, born in Poligny Jura, took a post of professor in the collège of Provins (Seine-et-Marne) in 1810, but died of tuberculosis on May 16, 1814. Hégésippe's mother Marie Roulliot (born Jeanne-Marie Rouillot, March 12, 1774 in Cluny Saône-et-Loire) went into the service of a Madame Guérard in Provins, and this lady would become Hégésippe's benefactor. Hégésippe began his studies in Provins, and then, when the Guérard family moved to the country, was placed in the seminary of Meaux (Seine-et-Marne), and later in the seminary of Avon (near Fontainebleau). His mother died of tuberculosis on February 5, 1823, while Hégésippe was a student at Avon. When he left Avon in 1828 (in his preface to the collected works of Hégésippe, Sainte-Beuve informs us that Hégésippe was an excellent student of classical literature and that he had a talent for Latin versification), he entered into apprenticeship as a proofreader for a publisher in Provins, Monsieur Lebeauin his works, Hégésippe refers to the daughter of M. Lebeau as his "sister" and he dedicated his short prose tales to her. Upon the passage of Charles X through Provins in 1828, Sainte-Beuve informs us, Moreau wrote his patriotic poem Vive le roi!. Hégésippe Moreau went to Paris before 1830. On the advice of M. Lebrun, he sent a copy of his Epistle on Printing to M. Firmin Didot and he was hired by the Didot publishing house, which was located on the rue Jacob, but left this employer shortly after. He took part in the July Revolution of 1830, worked briefly as a tutor (maître d’étude), and began to lead the Bohemian life. Shortly after the July Revolution, M. Lebrun was named director of the Imprimerie royale (Royal Publishing House) and tried to hire Hégésippe, but the twenty-year-old poet had already abandoned this career. In Paris, he was habitually houseless, and exposed himself to the dangers of a cholera hospital in the great epidemic of 1832 simply to obtain shelter and food. In 1833, ailing, he returned to Madame Guérard's in Provins to recuperate and began a kind of satirical serial called Diogène (named after the Greek Cynic Diogenes) modelled on the journal La Némésis published by Auguste-Marseille Barthélemy, but a lack of readership in the provincial town and creative rivalties made the venture a failure. Having alienated several of his supporters and participated in a duel, Hégésippe returned to Paris. From 1834 to 1838, he lived in great misery in Paris, and entirely ruined in his health, he was forced to take lodgings in a refuge of the destitute (Hôpital de la Charité). It was only just before his death that he succeeded in getting his collected poems published, selling the copyright for 4 sterling and 80 copies of the book. This volume, Myosotis (1838), was received not unfavourably, but the author's death of tuberculosis on 20 December 1838 created an interest in it which was proportionately excessive.

• Le Neveu de la fruitière, originally published in Journal des Enfants in 1836 • M; Scribe à l’Académie, originally published in La Psyché in January 1836 • Jeanne d’Arc, originally published in Journal des Demoiselles in May 1836 • Les petits Souliers, originally published in Journal des demoiselles in April 1836 • La Dame de cœur, originally published in Le petit Courrier des Dames in September 1836 • Le Gui de chêne, originally published in Journal des demoiselles in January 1837 • Thérèse Sureau, originally published in la Psyché in January 1837 • La Souris blanche, originally published in Journal des demoiselles in January 1837 The French version of Wikisource has copies of his works available.