Malot, Hector: Conscience:. v1, 21 Feb 2008
 

Hector-HENRI Malot, the son of a notary public, was born at La Brouille (Seine-Inferieure), March 20, 1830. He studied law, intending to devote himself also to the Notariat, but toward 1853 or 1854 commenced writing for various small journals. Somewhat later he assisted in compiling the ‘Biographie Generale’ of Firmin Didot, and was also a contributor to some reviews. Under the generic title of ‘Les Victimes d’Amour,’ he made his debut with the following three family-romances: ’Les Amants (1859), Les Epoux (1865), and Les Enfants (1866).’ About the same period he published a book, ‘La Vie Moderne en Angleterre.’ Malot has written quite a number of novels, of which the greatest is Conscience, crowned by the French Academy in 1878.

Conscience is a love story from beginning to end but so stained with blood and crime by the hero, Victor Saniel, as to be revolting on the one hand, while it is beautiful and rendered holy on the other, by the pure and lovely young creature Phillis Cormier, whom he had betrayed into matrimony and whose life and happiness he had ruined forever.