Fortuné du Boisgobey
BiographyFortuné Hippolyte Auguste Abraham-Dubois (September 11, 1821–February 26, 1891) was a French novelist who published under the nom de plume Fortuné du Boisgobey.
Born at Granville (Manche) and graduated from the Lycée Saint-Louis, he served as paymaster to the Army of Africa through several campaigns in Algeria from 1844 to 1848.nbsp; His parents were wealthy, yet at forty or upwards he took to writing. Using the name Fortuné Abraham-Dubois, he made his literary debut in 1843 in the Journal d'Avranches with a series entitled Lettres de Sicile, recounting a voyage he had taken the year before. His first successful novel, Les Deux comédiens, appeared in 1868 under the du Boisgobey pen name in the Petit Journal. The story was popular, and M. Paul Dalloz of the Petit Moniteur signed a contract with the author for seven years at 12,000ƒ a year. One of the chief followers of Émile Gaboriau, with whom his name is generally associated, he was prolific, with more than sixty works to his name, and became one of the most popular feuilleton writers.
In 1885 and 1886 he was President of the Committee of the Société des gens de lettres. He died in 1891 after a long illness.
Bibliography (wildly incomplete)
Lettres de Sicile (travelogue series, 1843)
Les Deux comédiens (1868)
Le Forçat colonel (The Convict Colonel) (1871)
Le Vrai Masque de fer (The Iron Mask) (1873)
L’As de cœur (The Ace of Hearts) (1875)
Le Coup de pouce (The Thumb Stroke) (1875)
La Vieillesse de M. Lecoq (The Old Age of Lecoq, the Detective) (1878)
The Matapan Affair (1882 English translation of the novel L’Affaire Matapan, 1881)
Acquittée (The Mysterious Juror) (1892)
Other links
Wikipedia