Déjazet, PAULINE VIRGINIE

Déjazet, PAULINE VIRGINIE, a great French actress, born at Paris, 30th August 1797. On the stage before she was five years old, she grew up playing children's and boys' rôles with marvellous precocity of intelligence and grace, but first awoke to a sense of her real greatness in an engagement at Lyons, where her playing of such parts as were then known as soubrettes endeared her to the citizens. In 1821 she began to play at the Gymnase, but her greatest triumphs were won at the Théâtre du Palais-Royal, whither she betook herself in 1834. From 1844 to 1849 she played at the Variétés, next at various Paris theatres, in the provinces, and at London, till 1859, when she undertook the management of the Folies-Dramatiques. She left the boards in 1868, next year received a pension of 2000 francs, and died 1st December 1875. See Lives by Lecomte (1866 and 1892) and Duval (1876).