PORTO-RICHE, GEORGE DE:

By: Isidore Singer, Jacques Kahn

French poet and dramatist; born of Italian parents at Bordeaux in 1849. He entered a banking-house at an early age, but was discharged on account of his poetic tendencies. He then studied law, but soon turned to his true vocation.

Porto-Riche has published the following volumes of poetry: "Prima Verba," 1872; "Tout N'est pas Rose," 1877; "Vanina," 1879; and "Bonheur Manqué," 1889, a little book of melancholy verses in which the author relates the memories of his lonely childhood. His dramatic works are as follows: "Le Vertige," 1873, a play in one act, represented at the Odéon, and marking the commencement of his dramatic success; and "Un Drame sous Philippe II.," 1875.

Estranged from his relatives and without money, Porto-Riche now saw several of his works rejected. The Comédie Française refused "Les Deux Fautes" (which, however, was later presented at the Odéon in 1878), "Le Calice," "Le Comte Marcelli," and L'Infidèle," 1891; but in 1883 "La Chance de Françoise," a one-act piece in prose, presented at the Théâtre Libre, marked an epoch in the contemporary history of the theater, and through it he now ranks as the leader of a school. He has written also "Amoureuse," 1891; "Le Passé," 1897, a remarkable comedy which was revived at the Comédie Française in 1902; and "Théâtre d'Amour," 1898. Porto-Riche has likewise been the dramatic critic of the "Estafette," succeeding Armand Silvestre, and of "La France " and "La Presse."

S. J. Ka.