About, EDMOND FRANÇOIS VALENTIN

About, EDMOND FRANÇOIS VALENTIN, an eminent French author, was born at Dieuze, in Lorraine, February 14, 1828. After a brilliant course at the Lycée Charlemagne and Ecole Normale in Paris, he went for two years to study archaeology at Athens, and on his return about the end of 1853, he published La Grèce contemporaine, a clever popular satire on modern Greek society. Its success opened to the young author the columns of the Paris journals, and in the Revue des Deux Mondes are long appeared his first novel, Tolla Feraldi, republished in 1855. About was accused of having taken many of the incidents of this story from a little-known Italian book, Vittoria Savorelli, and his reputation hardly recovered this charge until the appearance in the Moniteur of his series of stories, Les Mariages de Paris. From that time his literary career was a series of successes. His next novels were Le Roi des Montagnes (1856), a story full of humorous incident, which pleased everybody except the Greeks; and Germaine (1857), a clever story of contemporary Parisian life. Four other novels of note must be named: Les Échasses de Maître Pierre (1858), Madelon (1863), La Vieille Roche (1865), and Le Roman d'un Brave Homme (1880), the last an attempt, that had less success than it deserved, to show the French public that a novel may be interesting and yet fitted for general reading. None of About's works deserved their popularity more than his three short fantastic tales, L'Homme à l'Oreille Cassée, Le Nez d'un Notaire, and Le Cas de M. Guérin, all published in 1862; while his Trente et Quarante (1865), L'Infâme (1867), and Les Mariages de Province (1868), would of themselves have made a reputation. About contributed constantly to the journals of the day, and wrote many plays, few of which, however, were successful on the stage. As a publicist, he enjoyed a wide though mainly factitious reputation, several of his pamphlets being understood throughout Europe to be written with the approval of the Emperor of the French. As a newspaper correspondent he was present at the opening of the Suez Canal, and accompanied Macmahon in the Franco-German war. His Alsace (1872) and some newspaper articles cost him a week's imprisonment at the hands of the German authorities, who chose to treat him as a German subject, because he had been born in Lorraine. About had been decorated with the Cross of the Legion of Honour in 1868, and in 1884 received the coveted distinction of election to the Academy, but died just before he was formally received, January 17, 1885.