Charles Maurras

Charles Maurras
Charles Maurras in 1922.
Born	Charles-Marie-Photius Maurras (1868-04-20)20 April 1868 Martigues, Bouches-du-Rhône, France
Died	16 November 1952(1952-11-16) (aged 84) Tours, France
Region	Western Philosophy
School	Positivism Royalism Integralism Leader and principal thinker of the reactionary Action Française
Influences Auguste Comte Ernest Renan Joseph de Maistre Hippolyte Taine Maurice Barrès
Influenced Charles de Gaulle Philippe Pétain Jacques Maritain Pierre Boutang

Charles-Marie-Photius Maurras (French: [ʃaʁl moʁas]; 20 April 1868 – 16 November 1952) was a French author, poet, and critic. He was an organizer and principal philosopher of Action Française, a political movement that was monarchist, anti-parliamentarist, and counter-revolutionary. Maurras' ideas greatly influenced National Catholicism and "nationalisme intégral". A major tenet of integral nationalism was stated by Maurras as "a true nationalist places his country above everything". A political theorist and a major intellectual influence in early 20th-century Europe, his views anticipated some of the ideas of fascism.

Maurras was born in an old Provençal family, and brought up by his mother and grandmother in a Catholic and monarchist environment. In his early teens he became deaf. Like many other French politicians, he was affected greatly by the defeat during the 1870 Franco-Prussian War. After the 1871 Commune of Paris and the 1879 defeat of Marshall MacMahon's Moral Order government, French society slowly found a consensus for the Republic, symbolized by the rallying of the Orleanists to the Republic. Maurras published his first article, at the age of 17 years, in the review Annales de philosophie chrétienne. He then collaborated on various reviews, including L’Événement, La Revue bleue, La Gazette de France or La Revue encyclopédique, in which he praised Classicism and attacked Romanticism.