Astorg Audio

Henry IV of France, also known as the "Good King Henry", was King of France from 1589 to 1610. Born a Catholic but raised a Protestant, he barely escaped assassination in the St. Bartholomew's Day massacre, and later led Protestant forces against the...

The classical poetry of Japan focuses on direct experience of fleeting moments, in total contrast with its Occidental counterpart. These seminal poems were passed down orally, before great collections assembled works of art spanning several centuries...

Louis Philippe (1773–1850) is France's first "constitutional monarch", having being properly elected by the National Assembly. He lived through the French Revolution, during which he saw his brother and sister-in-law, Louis XVI and Marie-Antoinette,...

First published in 1752, Micromegas is one of Voltaire’s best-known works. It is a tale of mordant irony, and actually the original science-fiction short story. Arriving on Earth from the star Sirius, the gigantic explorer Micromegas discovers the...

Charles Baudelaire is one of the greatest French poets. His most famous work, Les Fleurs du Mal (The Flowers of Evil), was deemed scandalous at the time because of its themes of sex and death, lesbianism, corruption, wine, and the oppressiveness of...

Alongside Baudelaire, Mallarmé, and Rimbaud, with whom he had a stormy relationship, Paul Verlaine is one of the most influential poets of the fin de siècle. He was one of the greatest representatives of the Decadent movement that began in the 1870s,...

Victor Hugo is one of the best-known French writers, and one of the greatest literary figures of all time. His poetry made him famous very early, cementing his reputation as one of the greatest lyric poets when he was only 20 years old. We have...

Victor Hugo is one of the best-known French writers, and is part of the greatest literary figures of all time. His poetry made him famous very early, cementing his reputation as one of the greatest lyric poets when he was only 20 years old. He was...