BAZIN

bazin, rene (1853- ), french novelist and man of letters, was born at angers on the 26th of december 1853. he studied law in paris, and on his return to angers became professor of law in the catholic university there. he contributed to parisian journals a series of sketches of provincial life and descriptions of travel, but he made his reputation by _une tache d'encre_ (1888), which received a prize from the academy. other novels of great charm and delicacy followed: _la sarcelle bleue_ (1892); _madame corentine_ (1893); _humble amour_ (1894); _de toute son ame_ (1897); _la terre qui meurt_ (1899); _les oberle_ (1901), an alsatian story which was dramatized and acted in the following year; _l'ame alsacienne_ (1903); _donatienne_ (1903); _l'isolee_ (1905); _le ble qui leve_ (1907); _memoires d'une vieille fille_ (1908). _la terre qui meurt_, a picture of the decay of peasant farming and a story of la vendee, is an indirect plea for the development of provincial france. a volume of _questions litteraires et sociales_ appeared in 1906. rene bazin was admitted to the academy on the 28th of april 1904.