Jean-Toussaint Merle
Jean-Toussaint Merle (10 June 1785– 27 February 1852) was a French playwright and journalist. Biography. Merle had a good education at the Central School of the department of Hérault before arriving in Paris in 1803. At first an employee at the Ministry of Interior, he soon left the position for military service, and returned to Paris only towards the end of 1808. He then made his debut in literature. His amiable character and easy spirit made him a reputation for indolence which seems in little agreement with the activity of his literary life. He put his  name to more than one hundred and twenty plays, almost all of them made in collaboration. In turn attached to various newspapers, he has written numerous articles in the "Mercure de France", "la Gazette de France", , "Le Nain jaune", etc. For a long time he wrote the dramatic serial of . A spiritual critic and pleasant writer, he was among those who were appreciated by their contemporaries and whose name tend to disappear with the appropriateness of their works. Managing director of the théâtre de la Porte-Saint-Martin from 1822 to 1826, he presented many plays, some of which were  successful, at the théâtre du Vaudeville, théâtre des Variétés-Amusantes and . He married the famous actress Marie Dorval, the widow of Allan-Dorval. While he accompanied the maréchal de Bourmont as secretary and historiographer, he had the opportunity to write , 1831.