#sorry i am an illiterate imbecile mr gavarni sir

[clove-pinks]

Hi and happy birthday!

recently while scouring a book on internet archive for any information on the children of my favourite Napoleonic general Jean-Andoche Junot, I found some poetry written by Paul Gavarni on the album of Constance Aubert, Junot’s second daughter. Since you are The Gavarni Guy I wanted to show it to you, and also ask if you know anything of Gavarni’s relationship to the Junot family:

Gavarni also drew Constance in 1839:

(sorry for the long ask!)

Thank you for the birthday wishes! And WOW thank you for this ask!!!

Despite recently finding Gavarni's Journal des gens du monde on Gallica, I'm actually unfamiliar with Gavarni's literary works. One Gavarni scholar compared him to the poet Alfred de Musset, and remarked that it was striking "how few writers Gavarni did not know." Honoré de Balzac said, "Gavarni fait un livre â son insu, il vole les écrivains du jour."

Gavarni's best(?) biography is by the de Goncourt brothers, Gavarni, l'homme et l'oeuvre, but it doesn't seem like they have anything to say about the Junot family. I found a few references to his friendship with Constance Aubert, however! (Seemingly no connection to the printer Aubert et Cie, who published many Gavarni prints).