My Recollections

During the summer of 1902 I left Paris and went to my home in Egreville. Among the books and pamphlets I took with me was _Rome Vaincue_ by Alexandre Parodi. That magnificent tr...

At the beginning of the preceding winter, Henri Cain proposed to Henri Heugel a text for an opera based on Alphonse Daudet's famous romance _Sapho_. He went to Heugel in order t...

One summer morning in 1905 my great friend, Georges Cain, the eminent and eloquent historian of Old Paris, got together the beautiful, charming Mme. Georges Cain, Mlle. Lucy Arb...

As is my custom, I did not wait for _Manon's_ fate to be decided before I began to plague my publisher, Hartmann, to wake up and find me a new subject. I had hardly finished my...

My trips to Italy, journeys devoted to following, if not to the preparation of, the successive performances of _Le Roi de Lahore_ at Milan, Piacenza, Venice, Pisa and Trieste on...

The Opera-Comique was moved to the Place du Chatelet, in the old theater called Des Nations, which later became the Theatre Sarah Bernhardt. M. Paravey was appointed director. I...

The year 1891 was marked by an event which had a profound effect on my life. In the month of May of that year the publishing house of Hartmann went out of business.

I happened to see played at the Theatre-Francais three entirely novel acts which interested me very much. It was _Le Cherubin_ by Francis de Croisset. Two days later I was at th...

On Sunday, August first, Hartmann and I went to hear _Parsifal_ at the Wagner Theater at Bayreuth. After we had heard this _miracle unique_ we visited the capital of Upper Franc...

I became very ill at Paris. I felt that the path from life to death was so easy, the way seemed so gentle, so restful, that I was sorry to find myself back in the harsh, cutting...

One autumn morning in 1881 I was much disturbed, even anxious. Carvalho, the director of the Opera-Comique, had entrusted to me the three acts of _Phoebe_ by Henri Meilhac. I ha...

The performances of _Le Roi de Lahore_ were running on at the Opera and they were well attended and finely done. At least that is what I heard for I had already stopped going. P...

The study of the fables of mythology, which has had until recently only the interest of curiosity in even the most classical learning, has, thanks to the work of modern scholars...

What never to be forgotten times they were for youthful artists, when we shared our enthusiasms for all we saw in these pleasantly picturesque villages--a picturesqueness which...

On my return to Paris I lived with my wife's family in a lovely apartment whose brightness was calculated to delight the eye and charm the thoughts. Ambroise Thomas sent me word...

Were I to live a thousand years--which is hardly likely--I should never forget that fateful day, February 24, 1848, when I was just six years old. Not so much because it coincid...

My comrades went with me to the station "dei Termini," hard by the Diocletian ruins. They did not leave until we had embraced warmly and they stayed until my train disappeared b...

In the spring of 1910 my health was somewhat uncertain. _Roma_ had been engraved long before and was available material; _Panurge_ was finished and I felt--a rare thing for me--...

Death, which by taking away my mother had stricken me in my dearest affections, had also taken her mother from my dear wife. So we lived the next summer at Fontainebleau in a so...

I received the official notice of my nomination as professor at the Conservatoire and I went to Paris. I would have hardly imagined that I had said good-by to my beloved house a...

I regret all the more that I have given up traveling, for I seem to have become lazy in this regard, since my visits to Milan were always so delightful--I was going to say adora...

We remained in conference for several hours reviewing different subjects which were suitable for works to occupy me in the future. Finally we agreed on the fairy story of Cinder...

When I took my seat on the benches of the Conservatoire, I was rather delicate and not very tall. This was the excuse for the drawing which the celebrated caricaturist Cham made...

So I had won the first prize on the piano. I was doubtless as fortunate as I was proud, but it was out of the question for me to live on the memory of this distinction. The nece...

The winners of the Grand Prix de Rome for 1863 in painting, sculpture, architecture, and engraving, were Layraud and Monchablon, Bourgeois, Brune and Chaplain. Custom decreed--i...

Paris breathed once more after a long period of trouble and agony; gradually calm returned. As if the lesson of that bloody time would never fade away and as if its memory would...

As I had foreseen and gathered from the meaning looks which the pensionnaires exchanged, another joke, the masterpiece of the hazing, was arranged for us. We had hardly left the...

Our first _Marie Magdeleine_ on the stage was Lina Pacary. That born artist, in voice, beauty and talent was fitted for the creation of this part, and when the same theater late...

The first reading of _Marie Magdeleine_ to the cast took place at nine o'clock one morning in the small hall of the Maison Erard, Rue de Mail, which had been used heretofore for...

I have departed from this planet and I have left behind my poor earthly ones with their occupations which are as many as they are useless; at last I am living in the scintillati...