Paul Hervieu

Paul Hervieu, full name Paul-Ernest Hervieu (November 2, 1857 - October 25, 1915), French dramatist and novelist, was born at Neuilly-sur-Seine.

He was called to the bar in 1877, and, after serving some time in the office of the president of the council, he qualified for the diplomatic service, but resigned on his nomination in 1881 to a secretaryship in the French legation in Mexico.

He contributed novels, tales and essays to the chief Parisian papers and reviews, and published a series of clever novels, including "L'Inconnue" (1887), "Flirt" (1890), "L'Exorcisée" (1891), "Peints par eux-mêmes" (1893), an ironic study written in the form of letters, and "L'Armature" (1895), dramatized in 1905 by Eugène Brieux.

But his most important work consists of a series of plays:
*"Les Paroles restent" (Vaudeville, November 17, 1892)
*"Les Tenailes" (Théâtre Français, September 28, 1895)
*"La loi de l’homme" (Théâtre Français, February 15, 1897)
*"La Course du flambeau" (Vaudeville, April 17, 1901)
*"Point de lendemain" (Odéon, October 18, 1901), a dramatic version of a story by Vivant Denon
*"L'Énigme" (Théâtre Français, November 5, 1901)
*"Théroigne de Méricourt" (Théâtre Sarah Bernhardt, September 23, 1902)
*"Le Dédale" (Théâtre Français, December 19, 1903)
*"Le Réveil" (Théâtre Français, December 18, 1905)These plays are built upon a severely logical method, the mechanism of which is sometimes so evident as to destroy the necessary sense of illusion. The closing words of "La Course du flambeau" "Pour ma fille, j'ai tué ma mère" are an example of his selection of a plot representing an extreme theory. The riddle in "L'Énigme" (staged at Wyndham's Theatre, London, March 1 1902, as "Caesar's Wife") is, however, workedout with great art, and "Le Dédale", dealing with the obstacles to the remarriage of a divorced woman, is reckoned among the masterpieces of the modern French stage. He was elected to the French Academy in 1900.

Paul Hervieu died in 1915 and was interred in the Passy Cemetery in Paris.

See Alfred Binet, in "l’Année psychologique", vol. x. Hervieu's "Théâtre" was published by Lemerre (3 vols, 1900-1904).----