Captain Fracasse

Captain Fracasse (Le Capitaine Fracasse) - Gautier, Théophile. A translation into English by A. S. Kline. Published with illustrations by Gustave Doré from the Charpentier, Paris 1866 edition.

Théophile Gautier (1811-1872) was born in Tarbes, in the Hautes-Pyrénées region of south-west France, his family moving to Paris in 1814. He was a friend, at school, of the poet Gérard de Nerval, who introduced him to Victor Hugo. Gautier contributed to various journals, including La Presse, throughout his life, which offered opportunities for travel to various countries, among others Spain, Italy, Russia, Turkey and Egypt. He was a devotee of the ballet, writing a number of scenarios including that of Giselle. At the time of the 1848 Revolution, he expressed strong support for the ideals of the Second Republic, a support which he maintained for the rest of his life.

A successor to the first wave of Romantic writers, including Chateaubriand and Lamartine, he directed the Revue de Paris from 1851 to 1856, worked as a journalist for La Presse and Le Moniteur universel, and in 1856 became editor of L’Artiste, in which he published numerous editorials asserting his anti-utilitarian credo of ‘Art for art’s sake’. Saint-Beuve secured his critical acclaim; he became chairman of the Société Nationale des Beaux-Arts in 1862, and in 1868 was granted the sinecure of librarian to Princess Mathilde Bonaparte, a cousin of Napoleon III, having previously been introduced to her salon.

Gautier remained in Paris during the Franco-Prussian War of 1870-71, and the aftermath of the 1871 Commune, dying of heart disease at the age of sixty-one in 1872.

Though ostensibly a Romantic poet, Gautier may be seen as a forerunner to, or point of reference for, a number of divergent poetic movements including Symbolism and Modernism.

Le Capitaine Fracasse, an episodic novel written in 1863, has as its protagonist the Baron de Sigognac, an impoverished seventeenth-century nobleman who, in the reign of Louis XIII of France, abandons his château to join a theatrical company so as to pursue a young actress whom he loves. (For members of this comedy troupe, Gautier adopted and adapted characters from the traditional commedia dell’arte.) Sigognac travels with them to Paris, intending to petition the king and seek financial aid in memory of the services rendered to royalty by his ancestors. When one of the actors dies, Sigognac replaces him, taking the stage name of Captain Fracasse (the name derived from the word fracas, a skirmish or commotion), and, despite his innate pride, acting the part of a hapless military man. The experience teaches him humility, and this in turn deepens his relationship with the young actress he adores. The novel illustrates Gautier’s love of the theatrical, whether drama or ballet; his ability to navigate the ranks of his society without fear or favour; his aesthetic and poetic sensibilities; his expert command of language; and the humour, humanity, and tenderness with which he deals with the world, in all his writing.

This enhanced translation has been designed to offer maximum compatibility with current search engines. Among other modifications, the proper names of people and places, and the titles given to works of art, have been fully researched, modernised, and expanded; comments in parentheses have been added here and there to provide a reference, or clarify meaning; and minor typographic or factual errors, for example incorrect attributions and dates, in the original text, have been eliminated from this new translation.

Published by Poetry in Translation.