The Memoirs of François René Vicomte de Chateaubriand sometime Ambassador to England, Volume 1 (of 6) / Mémoires d'outre-tombe, volume 1

by vicomte de François-René Chateaubriand

I found one at almost the first asking, and it will ever remain a mystery to me why no complete translation of this admirable work has seen the light in England during the more than fifty years that have elapsed since the Mémoires d'outre-tombe were first published.

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The British Museum Library contains two attempts at a translation. One, published in the "Parlour Library of Instruction," is entitled, "An Autobiography. By François René, Viscount de Chateaubriand. London and Belfast: Simms & M'Intyre, 1849." It consists of four slim volumes containing in all less than half of the work. The other appeared, under the title of "Memoirs of Chateaubriand. Written by Himself. London: Henry Colburn, 1848-49. To be completed in ten parts," in "Colburn's Standard Library." Only three parts were published, embracing not more than a quarter of the Mémoires d'Outre-tombe.

In both cases the translator is anonymous; in both cases the translation seems careless and hastily made; in both cases the English version, as I have said, is far from complete.

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The present translation, by arrangement with the publishers, is complete in so far that no attempt whatever has been made at compression or condensation; nor has a single passage been omitted without the insertion of a footnote pointing out exactly where the omission occurs. The omissions are very few, and consist of the following:

1. All that portion of Chateaubriand's account of the career of Napoleon Bonaparte which touches the period during which the author was not himself residing in France and which is of historical rather than autobiographical interest. This portion Messrs. Freemantle hope to publish later, as a supplemental volume to the Memoirs. Left where it stood, it hampered the action of the work, and its omission is in no way noticeable.

2. Part of the account of the journey to Jerusalem which Chateaubriand quotes from the Itinerary of his body-servant Julien, side by side with his own; also some discursive correspondence and quotations following upon the Itinerary.

3. A selection from the writings of Chateaubriand's sister Lucile (Madame de Caud). This selection is a short one; but it is of interest to none save the author and her brother, and nothing is lost by the omission.

4. Some of the longer quotations from the French or Italian poets, besides a few poems by Chateaubriand himself.