Anecdotes

French novelist and journalist.

In 1728, five years after being ordained as a Benedictine priest, he fell out with the ecclesiastical authorities and fled to England, where he became a tutor in the household of Sir John Eyles. He lived in the Netherlands and again in London before returning to Paris in 1734.

Prévost's most famous work, "L'histoire du Chevalier des Grieux et de Manon Lescaut" (1731), inspired two ballets and a number of stage works, including Michael William Balfe's "The Maid of Artois" (1836), opéras-comiques by Daniel-François Auber Auber (1856) and Jules Massenet (1884), Kleinmichel's "Das Schloss de l'Orme" (1883), Giacomo Puccini's "Manon Lescaut" (1893), and Hans Werner Henze's "Boulevard Solitude" (1952).