Alphonse de Lamartine

Alphonse Marie Louis de Prat de Lamartine, Knight of Pratz (French: [alfɔ̃s maʁi lwi dəpʁa də lamaʁtin]; 21 October 1790 – 28 February 1869), was a French writer, poet and politician who was instrumental in the foundation of the Second Republic and the continuation of the Tricolore as the flag of France. 2Biography 3Early years Lamartine was born in Mâcon, Burgundy, on 21 October 1790. His family were members of the French provincial nobility, and he spent his youth at the family estate. Lamartine is famous for his partly autobiographical poem, "Le lac" ("The Lake"), which describes in retrospect the fervent love shared by a couple from the point of view of the bereaved man. Lamartine was masterly in his use of French poetic forms. Raised a devout Catholic, Lamartine became a pantheist, writing Jocelyn and La Chute d'un ange. He wrote Histoire des Girondins in 1847 in praise of the Girondists. Lamartine made his entrance into the field of poetry by a masterpiece, Les Méditations Poétiques (1820), and awoke to find himself famous. He was made a Chevalier of the Legion of Honour in 1825. He worked for the French embassy in Italy from 1825 to 182