Albert Sorel

Albert Sorel (13 August 1842 – 29 June 1906) was a French historian. He was born at Honfleur and remained throughout his life a lover of his native Normandy. His father, a rich manufacturer, wanted him to take over the business but his literary vocation prevailed. He went to live in Paris, where he studied law and, after a prolonged stay in Germany, entered the Foreign Office (1866). He had strongly developed literary and artistic tastes, was an enthusiastic musician (even composing a little), and wrote both poetry and novels (La Grande Falaise, 1785–1793, Le Docteur Egra in 1873); but he was not a socialite.

Anxious to understand present as well as past events, he was above all a student. In 1870 he was chosen as secretary by M. de Chaudordy, who had been sent to Tours as a delegate in charge of the diplomatic side of the problem of national defence. He proved a most valuable collaborator, full of finesse, good temper, and excellent judgment, and at the same time hard-working and discreet. After the war, when Emile Boutmy founded the Ecole libre des sciences politiques (which later became the Institut d'Etudes Politiques de Paris or, as it is more widely known, Sciences Po). Sorel was appointed to teach diplomatic history (1872), a duty which he performed with striking success. Some of his courses were converted into books: Le traité de Paris du 20 novembre 1815 (1873); Histoire diplomatique de la guerre franco-allemande (1875); and the Précis du droit des gens which he published (1877) in collaboration with his colleague Theodore Funck-Brentano.

In 1875 Sorel left the Foreign Office and became general secretary to the newly created office of the Présidence du sénat. Here again, in a position where he could observe and review affairs, he performed valuable service, especially under the presidency of the duc d'Audiffred Pasquier, who was glad to have Sorel's advice in the most serious crises of internal politics. His duties left him, however, sufficient leisure to enable him to accomplish the great work of his life, L'Europe et la revolution française. His object was to repeat the work already done by Heinrich von Sybel but from a less restricted point of view and with a clearer and calmer understanding of the chessboard of Europe. He spent almost thirty years in the preparation and composition of the eight volumes of this diplomatic history of the French Revolution (vol. i., 1885; vol. viii., 1904).

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