Alphonse de Lamartine

Alphonse Marie Louis de Prat de Lamartine (21 October 1790 – 28 February 1869) was a French writer, poet and politician who was instrumental in the foundation of the Second Republic. Lamartine was born in Mâcon, Burgundy on 21 October 1790. His family was part of the French provincial nobility, and he spent his youth at the family estate at Milly-Lamartine. He is famous for his partly autobiographical poem, "Le Lac" ("The Lake"), which describes in retrospect the fervent love shared by a couple from the point of view of the bereaved man.

Alphonse Marie Louis de Prat de Lamartine (21 October 1790 – 28 February 1869) was a French writer, poet and politician who was instrumental in the foundation of the Second Republic. Lamartine was born in Mâcon, Burgundy on 21 October 1790. His family was part of the French provincial nobility, and he spent his youth at the family estate at Milly-Lamartine. He is famous for his partly autobiographical poem, "Le Lac" ("The Lake"), which describes in retrospect the fervent love shared by a couple from the point of view of the bereaved man. Lamartine was masterly in his use of French poetic forms. Raised a devout Catholic, Lamartine became a pantheist, writing Jocelyn and La Chute d'un ange.

He wrote Histoire des Girondins in 1847 in praise of the Girondists. Lamartine in front of the Hôtel de Ville de Paris, on the 25 February 1848, by Félix Philippoteaux He worked for the French embassy in Italy from 1825 to 1828. In 1829, he was elected a member of the Académie française. He was elected a 'député' in 1833, and was briefly in charge of the government during the turbulence of 1848. He was Minister of Foreign Affairs from 24 February 1848 to 11 May 1848.

Due to his great age, Jacques-Charles Dupont de l'Eure, Chairman of the Provisional Government, effectively delegated many of his duties to Lamartine. He was then a member of the Executive Commission, the political body which served as France's joint Head of State. Lamartine was instrumental in the founding of the Second Republic of France, having met with Republican Deputies and journalists in the Hôtel de Ville to agree on the make-up of its provisional government. Lamartine himself was chosen to formally declare the Republic in traditional form from the balcony of the Hôtel de Ville. During his term as a politician in the Second Republic, he led efforts that eventually led to the abolition of slavery and the death penalty, as well as the enshrinement of the right to work and the short-lived national workshop programs. A political idealist who supported democracy and pacifism, his moderate stance on most issues caused his followers to desert him.

He was an unsuccessful candidate to the presidential election of 10 December 1848, receiving fewer than 19,000 votes. He subsequently retired from politics and dedicated himself to literature. Lamartine ended his life in poverty, publishing monthly installments of the Cours familier de littérature to support himself. He died in Paris in 1869. He is considered to be the first French romantic poet (though Charles-Julien Lioult de Chênedollé was working on similar innovations at the same time), and was acknowledged by Paul Verlaine and the Symbolists as an important influence. User-contributed text is available under the Creative Commons By-SA License and may also be available under the GNU FDL..