SOURCE: Introduction to Alexandre Dumas, Père: The Great Lover and Other Plays, adapted by Barnett Shaw, Frederick Ungar Publishing Co., 1969, pp. 1-4.

In the following essay, Shaw offers a condensed overview of Dumas's life and works.

Alexandre Dumas was the son of a mulatto general, Thomas-Alexandre Dumas, who served under Napoleon. His grandfather was the Marquis Davy de la Pailleterie, who had married a native named Marie-Cessette Dumas while running a plantation on the island of Haiti. Both Dumas and his father ignored the title to which they had a right, preferring to use the name Dumas.

Dumas was born in Villers-Cotterets, forty miles from Paris, on July 24, 1802. After finishing his schooling he went to Paris and obtained a position as clerk for the Duke of Orleans. It was not long before he had a mistress, and in 1824, a son. The son, Alexandre Dumas fils, was destined...