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Juiliette Drouet's Illustrations in her letters to Victor Hugo

Drouet letter crop
Discover highlights from the collection of over 400 letters written to Victor Hugo by Juliette Drouet held in Special Collections.
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Drouet letter dated 07 Jan 1847
Exploring the Drouet Letters in Special Collections - Les Misérables
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Drouet letter dated 30th January 1849
Exploring the Drouet Letters in Special Collections - Reporting the Second Republic.
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Drouet  letter dated 17th June 1848
Exploring the Drouet Letters in Special Collections - Illustrated letter
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Drouet letter dated 5 th July 1848
Exploring the Drouet Letters in Special Collections - argo and neologisms
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Drouet letter dated 15th June 1849
Exploring the Drouet Letters in Special Collections - Medicine and disease
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The Second Republic was not a happy period in Drouet and Hugo’s relationship.

Hugo was overloaded with his political activities and therefore spent less time with Drouet. He also had a further affair with Léonie d’Aunet, a writer and explorer.

As a result, Drouet often seemed paranoid about Hugo’s infidelities (with reason) and would complain about his neglect of her in almost every letter.

In this letter dated 17th June 1848 (see image) she added a drawing of herself shooting an arrow at the National Assembly, as Hugo spent too much time there for her liking.

The use of drawings is quite uncommon for the time as correspondence was considered a serious activity.

The Leeds collection counts four letters with this type of humorous drawing, while several dozen have been discovered during the processing of her 15,000 letters held in the French National Library.