Eugène Scribe

Eugène Scribe was a French dramatist and one of the most influential librettists of the nineteenth century. Trained for the law, he turned to the theatre and learned his trade doggedly, first in comédies-vaudevilles and then in "well-made" plays such as Le verre d'eau, built on the deft management of plot. He worked with collaborators all his life. His librettos shaped French grand opera, from Auber's La muette de Portici to Meyerbeer's Robert le diable, Les Huguenots and Le prophète, and he also wrote for Boieldieu, Halévy, Donizetti and Verdi. He was elected to the Académie française in 1836.