Monsieur, Madame and Bebe, Volume 1

Antoine Gustave Droz (1832-1895), French man of letters, son of the sculptor J. A. Droz (1807-1872), was born in Paris. He was educated as an artist, and began to exhibit in the Salon of 1857. A series of sketches dealing gaily and lightly with the intimacies of family life, published in the Vie Parisienne and issued in book form as Monsieur, Madame et Bb (1866), won for the author an immediate and great success. Entre Flous (1867) was built on a similar plan, and was followed by some psychological novels: Le Cahier Bieu de Mile Cibot (1868), Autour Dune Source (1869), Un Paquet de Lettres (1870), Babolein (1872), Les Etangs (1875) and L'Enfant (1885). His Tristesses et Sourires (1884) is a delicate analysis of the niceties of family intercourse and its difficulties. Droz's first book was translated into English under the title of Monsieur, Madame and Bebe (1887).