Frédéric Mistral

Frédéric Mistral (1830–1914) was born at Maillane, near Saint-Rémy-de-Provence, the son of a prosperous farmer. After studying law at Aix he gave his life to the Provençal language: in 1854 he was one of seven poets who founded the Félibrige, a society for the revival of the language and literature of Provence, and he went on to compile its great dictionary, Lou Tresor dóu Felibrige.

His pastoral epic Mirèio (1859), in twelve cantos, tells of a farmer's daughter and a basket-weaver's son whose love is broken by her parents' pride. Lamartine hailed it, and the Académie française crowned it. Mistral wrote further long poems, including Calendau and Lou Pouèmo dóu Rose, and in 1904 he shared the Nobel Prize in Literature. The English version here is Harriet Waters Preston's translation (1872).