Ludovic Halévy

Ludovic Halévy wrote the words the nineteenth century sang: with Henri Meilhac he made the libretti for Offenbach's operettas and, above all, for Carmen. He spent twenty years as a civil servant before the theatre paid, then turned novelist in middle age with L'Abbé Constantin, a book so gentle the Académie française elected him partly on its charm. Degas painted him backstage.