Victor Hugo, Hernani

Phillip John Usher (New York University)

Ed. by Tim Unwin, University of Bristol
The Literary Encyclopedia. Volume 1.5.2.05: French Writing and Culture: The Nineteenth-Century , 1800-1900.
Vol. editors: David Elwyn Evans (University of St Andrews), Edward Forman (University of Bristol), Elisabeth Gerwin (University of Lethbridge), Nigel Harkness (University of Newcastle upon Tyne), Tim Unwin (University of Bristol), David Williams (University of Sheffield), Jennifer Yee (University of Oxford)

Dates

First circulation or publication 1830

Places

France (Country of Origin)

Genres and Modes

Play

Resources

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The raucous and rowdy first productions in 1830s Paris of Victor Hugo’s play

Hernani

, a Romantic story of love and honor set in sixteenth-century Spain, marked a turning point in the history of French theater. Classicism’s reign was now over. If Madame de Staël’s

De l’Allemagne

(1810-13) had announced the arrival in France of Romanticism, it was Hugo’s

Hernani

that signaled its public triumph. The antagonism between Hugo’s revolutionary ideas about theater and the reactions of the French theater-going public and traditionalist critics, still attached to the forms of earlier generations, became known as the

bataille d’Hernani

[Battle of Hernani]. Hugo and his followers believed that the tragedies of Racine and Corneille, as well as the

style noble

in which they were written,…

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2075 words

Citation: Usher, Phillip John. "Hernani". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 15 November 2010 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/sworks.php?rec=true&UID=11219, accessed 25 April 2024.]

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