A Biographical Dictionary of Modern Rationalists/About, Edmond François Valentin
About, Edmond François Valentin, French novelist and dramatist. B. Feb. 14, 1828. Ed. Ècole Normals, Paris, and Ècole Française d Athènes. About carried off the literary prize in his college against Victor Hugo, H. Taine, and F. Sarcey; and his first published work, La grèce contemporaine (1855), led reviewers to compare him with Voltaire. He had had a thorough training in philosophy, but in 1854 he deserted abstract thought for fiction, and his Germaine (1857) and other brilliant novels soon put him in the front rank of his art. Many of his novels have appeared in English. He wrote also in the Figaro, under the name of Valentin de Quevilly, and produced several plays. He was an intimate friend of Prince Jerome Bonaparte, who was as anti-clerical as himself; but he cordially accepted the Republic in 1871. "Il n'y a que les morts et les sots qui ne changent jamais," he said. About was admitted to the Legion of Honour in 1867, and to the Academy in 1884. His drastic rejection of all religious beliefs is best seen in his Question romaine (1859; English translation same year), which he wrote after spending some months in Rome. It is the most powerful exposure in any literature of the foul condition of the Papal States before 1870, and its style moved Scherer to describe the author as "the grandson of Voltaire." About says that an act of faith is "to close one's eyes in order to see better." D. Jan. 16, 1885.