Stendhal

Marie-Henri Beyle
Stendhal, by Olof Johan Södermark, 1840
Born	(1783-01-23)23 January 1783 Grenoble, France
Died	23 March 1842(1842-03-23) (aged 59) Paris, France
Occupation	Writer
Literary movement	Realism

Marie-Henri Beyle (French: [bɛl]; 23 January 1783 – 23 March 1842), better known by his pen name Stendhal (French: [stɛ̃dal] or [stɑ̃dal]; in English [ˈstɒ̃dɑːl],/stɛnˈdɑːl/, or /stænˈdɑːl/), was a 19th-century French writer. Best known for the novels Le Rouge et le Noir (The Red and the Black, 1830) and La Chartreuse de Parme (The Charterhouse of Parma, 1839), he is highly regarded for the acute analysis of his characters' psychology and considered one of the earliest and foremost practitioners of realism.

Born in Grenoble, Isère, he was an unhappy child, disliking his "unimaginative" father and mourning his mother, whom he passionately loved, and who died when he was seven. He spent "the happiest years of his life" at the Beyle country house in Claix near Grenoble. His closest friend was his younger sister, Pauline, with whom he maintained a steady correspondence throughout the first decade of the 19th century.