Jules Barbey d’Aurevilly , (November 2, 1808, to April 23, 1889), was a French writer, of fiction and literary criticism. According to the Encyclopedia Britannica he was a "member of the minor nobility of Normandy, ...[and] remained throughout his life proudly Norman in spirit and style, a royalist opposed to democracy and materialism and an ardent but unorthodox Roman Catholic."
Barbey d’Aurevilly achieved a prominent position in the French literary world.
Although he was "... often arbitrary, vehement, and intensely personal in his criticism, especially of Émile Zola and the Naturalist school, ... [his verdicts] have stood the test of time; he recognized the attainments of Honoré de Balzac, Stendhal, and Charles Baudelaire when they were far from being fully appreciated."
According to another historian, in 19th century France:
The companionship of a like-minded animal became a trope of intellectuals, the cat a sign for the literary life, a signature. Jules Barbey d'Aurevilly, for example, had a cat named Demonette, "or rather Desdemone — Demonette to close friends."
Barbey d’Aurevilly acquired Demonette in 1884, and the cat is said to have especially liked reclining on the freshly inked foolscap, those pages which Barbey d'Aurevilly had laid out so the ink of his latest composition could dry. Even in our own foolscapless times, we can relate to this feline presumption.
Barbey d’Aurevilly acquired Demonette in 1884, and the cat is said to have especially liked reclining on the freshly inked foolscap, those pages which Barbey d'Aurevilly had laid out so the ink of his latest composition could dry. Even in our own foolscapless times, we can relate to this feline presumption.
The cat story we found in The Beast in the Boudoir: Petkeeping in Nineteenth-century Paris by Kathleen Kete (1994.) Her title alludes to a story of Henry James's. The Beast in the Jungle." This book is very well researched and written.
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