Originally published 1820 | ||
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Le Lac (English : The Lake) is one of the most famous poems of Lamartine, in the Méditations poétiques published in1820.
Julie Charles (the wife of the famous physicist Jacques Charles) was a person Lamartine admired. The poet's muse couldn't go to the Lac du Bourget (place of many meets) in August 1817 where she must meet him again. Phtisist, she died soon after. Lamartine came back alone to see again the places he visited before with her. Surprises to find the nature always similar to itself and indifferent, he wished she to keep at least the memory of their past happiness. The melodious sweetness of the verse happily shows the voluptuous calm of a summer night, and the rapid outflow of the hours. The oeuvre, compound of sixteen quatrains, met a big success and propelled its author at the forefront of the romantic poetry and of the lyricism.
This composition is often compared to the Tristesse d'Olympio, of Victor Hugo and to the Souvenir of Alfred de Musset. It was set to music by Niedermeyer.