The Project Gutenberg EBook of A Woodland Queen, Complete, by Andre Theuriet

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Title: A Woodland Queen, Complete

Author: Andre Theuriet

Last Updated: March 3, 2009
Release Date: October 5, 2006 [EBook #3938]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A WOODLAND QUEEN, COMPLETE ***

Produced by David Widger

A WOODLAND QUEEN

('Reine des Bois')

By ANDRE THEURIET

With a Preface by MELCHIOR DE VOGUE, of the French academy

ANDRE THEURIET

CLAUDE-ADHEMAR-ANDRE THEURIET was born at Marly-le-Roi (Seine et Oise),
October 8,1833. His ancestors came from Lorraine. He was educated at
Bar-le-Duc and went to Paris in 1854 to study jurisprudence. After
finishing his courses he entered the Department of the Treasury, and
after an honorable career there, resigned as chef-de-bureau. He is a
poet, a dramatist, but, above all, a writer of great fiction.

As early as 1857 the poems of Theuriet were printed in the 'Revue de
Paris' and the 'Revue des Deux Mondes'. His greatest novel, 'Reine des
Bois' (Woodland Queen), was crowned by the Academie Francaise in 1890.
To the public in general he became first known in 1870 by his 'Nouvelles
Intimes'. Since that time he has published a great many volumes of
poems, drama, and fiction. A great writer, he perhaps meets the wishes
of that large class of readers who seek in literature agreeable rest and
distraction, rather than excitement or aesthetic gratification. He is
one of the greatest spirits that survived the bankruptcy of Romanticism.
He excels in the description of country nooks and corners; of that
polite rusticity which knows nothing of the delving laborers of 'La
Terre', but only of graceful and learned leisure, of solitude nursed in
revery, and of passion that seems the springtide of germinating
nature. He possesses great originality and the passionate spirit of a
'paysagiste': pictures of provincial life and family-interiors seem to
appeal to his most pronounced sympathies. His taste is delicate, his
style healthy and frank, and at the same time limpid and animated.

After receiving, in 1890, the Prix Vitet for the ensemble of his
literary productio