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Gemenele
A historical novel set in La Vendée (in the environs of Nantes) in 1832. In 1830, the last Bourbon King, Charles X, was forced to abdicate in favour of Dumas' employer, Louis Philippe (1773-1850), who styled himself "King of the French" and endeavoured to rule as a constitutional monarch.
In 1832, the widowed mother of the young Bourbon pretender, Henri V, Marie-Caroline de Bourbon-Sicilie (1798-1870), the Countess de Berry, made a clandestine return from exile and attempted to lead an uprising against Louis-Philippe in favor of her son. Her supporters generally refused to take up arms, except in La Vendée, the center of Royalist opposition to the French Revolution, and the scene of savage partisan warfare in the 1790's. There, an abortive upraising was suppressed by Government forces, and tailed off into banditry.
From this episode, Dumas fashioned an immense and very interesting novel. The eponymous "Louves de Machecoul" are the beautiful twin daughters of the Marquis de Souday, a royalist partisan fighter who fled into exile when Napoleon suppressed the resistance, and returned to reclaim his ancestral lands in 1815. The family are all ardent Legitimists--supporters of the Countess de Berry.
The twins encounter the wimpy Michel, son of a commoner who had become rich by betraying the Royalist guerillas to Napoleon’s forces, who, after the war, is killed in a suspicious hunting accident. Michel, smitten with the twins, promptly offers his services to the Legitimist cause. Michel fights bravely in the uprising and falls in love with Mary, while the other twin, Berthe, falls in love with Michel. Through a misunderstanding, Michel is betrothed to the wrong twin.
As the revolution collapses, the characters find themselves hunted by the Government forces of the energetic General Dermoncourt, and continually subject to betrayal and arrest.
Alexandre Dumas was a proponent of a set of antique and aristocratic virtues: duty, honor, courage, and loyalty. In Louves de Machecoul these virtues lead to a pointless war. General Dermoncourt, in his tribute to the Countess de Berry, describes her as "having been born two centuries too late." The Countess who believes that duty requires her to struggle to uphold her son's rights, learns that the struggle requires the death of her most devoted adherents.
This novel, with its flashes of ambivalence, realistic descriptions of guerilla war, emotional growth of its characters, and insight into the tensions of post-revolutionary France, suggests that the mature Dumas had become a wiser and more thoughtful man than course of many of his earlier novels would have suggested.
In 1832, the widowed mother of the young Bourbon pretender, Henri V, Marie-Caroline de Bourbon-Sicilie (1798-1870), the Countess de Berry, made a clandestine return from exile and attempted to lead an uprising against Louis-Philippe in favor of her son. Her supporters generally refused to take up arms, except in La Vendée, the center of Royalist opposition to the French Revolution, and the scene of savage partisan warfare in the 1790's. There, an abortive upraising was suppressed by Government forces, and tailed off into banditry.
From this episode, Dumas fashioned an immense and very interesting novel. The eponymous "Louves de Machecoul" are the beautiful twin daughters of the Marquis de Souday, a royalist partisan fighter who fled into exile when Napoleon suppressed the resistance, and returned to reclaim his ancestral lands in 1815. The family are all ardent Legitimists--supporters of the Countess de Berry.
The twins encounter the wimpy Michel, son of a commoner who had become rich by betraying the Royalist guerillas to Napoleon’s forces, who, after the war, is killed in a suspicious hunting accident. Michel, smitten with the twins, promptly offers his services to the Legitimist cause. Michel fights bravely in the uprising and falls in love with Mary, while the other twin, Berthe, falls in love with Michel. Through a misunderstanding, Michel is betrothed to the wrong twin.
As the revolution collapses, the characters find themselves hunted by the Government forces of the energetic General Dermoncourt, and continually subject to betrayal and arrest.
Alexandre Dumas was a proponent of a set of antique and aristocratic virtues: duty, honor, courage, and loyalty. In Louves de Machecoul these virtues lead to a pointless war. General Dermoncourt, in his tribute to the Countess de Berry, describes her as "having been born two centuries too late." The Countess who believes that duty requires her to struggle to uphold her son's rights, learns that the struggle requires the death of her most devoted adherents.
This novel, with its flashes of ambivalence, realistic descriptions of guerilla war, emotional growth of its characters, and insight into the tensions of post-revolutionary France, suggests that the mature Dumas had become a wiser and more thoughtful man than course of many of his earlier novels would have suggested.
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First published January 1, 1894
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About the author
Alexandre Dumas
6,985 books12.3k followersThis note regards Alexandre Dumas, père, the father of Alexandre Dumas, fils (son). For the son, see Alexandre Dumas fils.
Alexandre Dumas père, born Alexandre Dumas Davy de la Pailleterie, was a towering figure of 19th-century French literature whose historical novels and adventure tales earned global renown. Best known for The Three Musketeers, The Count of Monte Cristo, and other swashbuckling epics, Dumas crafted stories filled with daring heroes, dramatic twists, and vivid historical backdrops. His works, often serialized and immensely popular with the public, helped shape the modern adventure genre and remain enduring staples of world literature.
Dumas was the son of Thomas-Alexandre Dumas, a celebrated general in Revolutionary France and the highest-ranking man of African descent in a European army at the time. His father’s early death left the family in poverty, but Dumas’s upbringing was nonetheless marked by strong personal ambition and a deep admiration for his father’s achievements. He moved to Paris as a young man and began his literary career writing for the theatre, quickly rising to prominence in the Romantic movement with successful plays like Henri III et sa cour and Antony.
In the 1840s, Dumas turned increasingly toward prose fiction, particularly serialized novels, which reached vast audiences through French newspapers. His collaboration with Auguste Maquet, a skilled plotter and historian, proved fruitful. While Maquet drafted outlines and conducted research, Dumas infused the narratives with flair, dialogue, and color. The result was a string of literary triumphs, including The Three Musketeers and The Count of Monte Cristo, both published in 1844. These novels exemplified Dumas’s flair for suspenseful pacing, memorable characters, and grand themes of justice, loyalty, and revenge.
The D’Artagnan Romances—The Three Musketeers, Twenty Years After, and The Vicomte of Bragelonne—cemented his fame. They follow the adventures of the titular Gascon hero and his comrades Athos, Porthos, and Aramis, blending historical fact and fiction into richly imagined narratives. The Count of Monte Cristo offered a darker, more introspective tale of betrayal and retribution, with intricate plotting and a deeply philosophical core.
Dumas was also active in journalism and theater. He founded the Théâtre Historique in Paris, which staged dramatizations of his own novels. A prolific and energetic writer, he is estimated to have written or co-written over 100,000 pages of fiction, plays, memoirs, travel books, and essays. He also had a strong interest in food and published a massive culinary encyclopedia, Le Grand Dictionnaire de cuisine, filled with recipes, anecdotes, and reflections on gastronomy.
Despite his enormous success, Dumas was frequently plagued by financial troubles. He led a lavish lifestyle, building the ornate Château de Monte-Cristo near Paris, employing large staffs, and supporting many friends and relatives. His generosity and appetite for life often outpaced his income, leading to mounting debts. Still, his creative drive rarely waned.
Dumas’s mixed-race background was a source of both pride and tension in his life. He was outspoken about his heritage and used his platform to address race and injustice. In his novel Georges, he explored issues of colonialism and identity through a Creole protagonist. Though he encountered racism, he refused to be silenced, famously replying to a racial insult by pointing to his ancestry and achievements with dignity and wit.
Later in life, Dumas continued writing and traveling, spending time in Belgium, Italy, and Russia. He supported nationalist causes, particularly Italian unification, and even founded a newspaper to advocate for Giuseppe Garibaldi. Though his popularity waned somewhat in his final years, his literary legacy grew steadily. He wrote in a style that was accessible, entertaining, and emotionally reso
Alexandre Dumas père, born Alexandre Dumas Davy de la Pailleterie, was a towering figure of 19th-century French literature whose historical novels and adventure tales earned global renown. Best known for The Three Musketeers, The Count of Monte Cristo, and other swashbuckling epics, Dumas crafted stories filled with daring heroes, dramatic twists, and vivid historical backdrops. His works, often serialized and immensely popular with the public, helped shape the modern adventure genre and remain enduring staples of world literature.
Dumas was the son of Thomas-Alexandre Dumas, a celebrated general in Revolutionary France and the highest-ranking man of African descent in a European army at the time. His father’s early death left the family in poverty, but Dumas’s upbringing was nonetheless marked by strong personal ambition and a deep admiration for his father’s achievements. He moved to Paris as a young man and began his literary career writing for the theatre, quickly rising to prominence in the Romantic movement with successful plays like Henri III et sa cour and Antony.
In the 1840s, Dumas turned increasingly toward prose fiction, particularly serialized novels, which reached vast audiences through French newspapers. His collaboration with Auguste Maquet, a skilled plotter and historian, proved fruitful. While Maquet drafted outlines and conducted research, Dumas infused the narratives with flair, dialogue, and color. The result was a string of literary triumphs, including The Three Musketeers and The Count of Monte Cristo, both published in 1844. These novels exemplified Dumas’s flair for suspenseful pacing, memorable characters, and grand themes of justice, loyalty, and revenge.
The D’Artagnan Romances—The Three Musketeers, Twenty Years After, and The Vicomte of Bragelonne—cemented his fame. They follow the adventures of the titular Gascon hero and his comrades Athos, Porthos, and Aramis, blending historical fact and fiction into richly imagined narratives. The Count of Monte Cristo offered a darker, more introspective tale of betrayal and retribution, with intricate plotting and a deeply philosophical core.
Dumas was also active in journalism and theater. He founded the Théâtre Historique in Paris, which staged dramatizations of his own novels. A prolific and energetic writer, he is estimated to have written or co-written over 100,000 pages of fiction, plays, memoirs, travel books, and essays. He also had a strong interest in food and published a massive culinary encyclopedia, Le Grand Dictionnaire de cuisine, filled with recipes, anecdotes, and reflections on gastronomy.
Despite his enormous success, Dumas was frequently plagued by financial troubles. He led a lavish lifestyle, building the ornate Château de Monte-Cristo near Paris, employing large staffs, and supporting many friends and relatives. His generosity and appetite for life often outpaced his income, leading to mounting debts. Still, his creative drive rarely waned.
Dumas’s mixed-race background was a source of both pride and tension in his life. He was outspoken about his heritage and used his platform to address race and injustice. In his novel Georges, he explored issues of colonialism and identity through a Creole protagonist. Though he encountered racism, he refused to be silenced, famously replying to a racial insult by pointing to his ancestry and achievements with dignity and wit.
Later in life, Dumas continued writing and traveling, spending time in Belgium, Italy, and Russia. He supported nationalist causes, particularly Italian unification, and even founded a newspaper to advocate for Giuseppe Garibaldi. Though his popularity waned somewhat in his final years, his literary legacy grew steadily. He wrote in a style that was accessible, entertaining, and emotionally reso
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Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
September 10, 2020
Dumas introduces a cavalcade of excellent characters in this forgotten tale of the 1832 royalist uprising in the Vendée. I particularly appreciated Dermoncourt’s extraordinary talent for induction (Volume 1, Ch. 36-37), which, when considered alongside Maillard’s feat of detection in Countess de Charny really makes me wish Dumas had tackled a mystery story at some point.
And Trigaud-Vermin’s Herculean abilities leave one wondering who would win in a fight between himself and Porthos. Incidentally, Dumas, in boasting about his own father’s strength, made, at various times, outlandish claims. Dumas borrows somewhat from his own tall tales in sketching out Trigaud, for instance in holding out four muskets on four fingers of one hand. From the otherwise atrocious biography, Dumas: Father and Son:
Finally, as an historical aside, the uprising in the novel is a flash in the pan, but the two sides, royalists/Bourbons and Orléanists (absurdly) each maintain a claim to who is the “rightful” king of France in the present day, and keep in mind that France is a republic. As silly as the 1832 Vendéan skirmishes might seem now (and possibly in Dumas’ time), it never prevents the reader from admiring nobility, heroism, bravery, and integrity wherever one finds it, or whichever side of the battle lines.
And Trigaud-Vermin’s Herculean abilities leave one wondering who would win in a fight between himself and Porthos. Incidentally, Dumas, in boasting about his own father’s strength, made, at various times, outlandish claims. Dumas borrows somewhat from his own tall tales in sketching out Trigaud, for instance in holding out four muskets on four fingers of one hand. From the otherwise atrocious biography, Dumas: Father and Son:
“The measurement of his calf, we are told, was precisely that of his wife’s waist. He could insert his four fingers in the barrels of four muskets and hold out the four muskets at arm’s length. He could bite pieces out of steel helmets. He could hop around a room, holding a man in each arm. He could grasp an overhead beam, while on horseback, and lift the horse off the ground by the grip of his riding muscles.”
Finally, as an historical aside, the uprising in the novel is a flash in the pan, but the two sides, royalists/Bourbons and Orléanists (absurdly) each maintain a claim to who is the “rightful” king of France in the present day, and keep in mind that France is a republic. As silly as the 1832 Vendéan skirmishes might seem now (and possibly in Dumas’ time), it never prevents the reader from admiring nobility, heroism, bravery, and integrity wherever one finds it, or whichever side of the battle lines.
May 6, 2023
[Wilczyce]
-Istnieje bożek, który opiekuje się zakochanymi i pijakami-
-Istnieje bożek, który opiekuje się zakochanymi i pijakami-
November 11, 2019
So, overall, my summary of this book slightly differs on the break down of both books. This is a two part book which focuses on the events of 1832 trying to re establish the Monarch from Henry V, who, although on the throne for only 7 days was never crowned king of France. For Victor Hugo Fans, this book covers the same time period as Les Miserables.
The story revolves around a specific regional part of France near Nantes, and, although has undertones of Royalist and Republican friction (which is seen in the first books flashbacks to 1793 - 76 and references to Napoleon) the essence of this story is love. A love triangle between Michel, Mary and Bertha, a miss understanding and miss communication of love and a love interest and how it was ultimately resolved.
Some parts made me smile, very reminiscent of similar French Novels, ‘The Three Musketeers’ especially of requesting a prisoners word of honour not to escape and walking along arm in arm without fear of reprisals.
Overall an excellent Dumas book to read.
The story revolves around a specific regional part of France near Nantes, and, although has undertones of Royalist and Republican friction (which is seen in the first books flashbacks to 1793 - 76 and references to Napoleon) the essence of this story is love. A love triangle between Michel, Mary and Bertha, a miss understanding and miss communication of love and a love interest and how it was ultimately resolved.
Some parts made me smile, very reminiscent of similar French Novels, ‘The Three Musketeers’ especially of requesting a prisoners word of honour not to escape and walking along arm in arm without fear of reprisals.
Overall an excellent Dumas book to read.
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August 26, 2015Free download available at Project Gutenberg.
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews