Prosper Merimée

Prosper Merimée was born in France in 1803 to a wealthy family. At university, he studied law, Greek, Spanish, English and Russian and learnt these languages well enough to translate many Russian and Greek writers to French for the first time. He was the private teacher of a Spanish aristocrat, who later became the Empress of France. He also worked as an archaeologist and became the director of historical buildings in the country. He was actively interested in politics as well and served as a French Senator. In short, there was nothing Merimée could not do – including writing short stories! He died in 1873.