Alexandre Dumas
Writer
Alexandre Dumas wrote the classic adventure novel The Three Musketeers and some of the most famous and popular stories in French literature. Beginning in 1844 he had a string of brilliantly successful books, publishing The Three Musketeers (1844, first printed in serial form) and following it with The Count of Monte Cristo (1845), Twenty Years After (1845) and The Black Tulip (1850), among many others. A great celebrity writer of the day, he was almost as famous for his reckless spending and lavish lifestyle, and he was frequently in debt. In his last days he was supported by his illegitimate son, the author Alexandre Dumas the Younger.Extra credit: Dumas and his son are often referred to as Dumas peré (father) and Dumas fils (son)... Alexandre Dumas was one-quarter black; his grandfather had married a slave while serving as a government official in what is now Haiti.
Other adventure novelists of the 1800s include Sir Walter Scott (of Ivanhoe fame) and H. Rider Haggard (creator of Allan Quatermain).
Four Good Links
The Alexandre Dumas Pere Website
Terrific collection of Dumas data, in English and French
The Works of Dumas
Online texts of several of his works
The Three Musketeers
Introduction to the novel, with biographical background on Dumas
Fireblade Coffeehouse: Alexandre Dumas
Big list of good links to Dumas online
Vital Stats
Birth
Birthplace
Death
5 December 1870
(natural causes, age 68)
Best Known As
The author of The Three Musketeers
