Laetitia Marie Wyse Bonaparte

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Mme. de Solms-Rattazzi-de Rute Lætitia Marie Wyse Bonaparte (1829 - 1902) was a French author, born at Waterford, Ireland. She is supposed to be the granddaughter of Lucien Bonaparte by his second wife, through the marriage of his daughter Letizia to Thomas Wyse, an Irishman.

In 1850 she married Frédéric Solms. The marriage dissolved four years later, and she took the title Princess de Solms, settled in Savoy, not then a part of France, and in 1853 founded Les martinées d' Aix. She became a socialite keeping friendships with Victor Hugo, Lajos Kossuth, Eugène Sue, Alphonse de Lamartine, Hughes Felicité Robert de Lamennais, Alexandre Dumas, père, Victor Henri Rochefort, Marquis de Rochefort-LuCay and Tony Revillon. Through Sainte Beuve, she contributed to the Constitutionnel under the pen name of Baron Stock.

After Savoy was annexed to France (1860), she went back to Paris where she played a prominent part in the literary and social events of the time. In 1863, her husband having died, she married Italian statesman Urbano Rattazzi, and lived with him in Italy. After he died, she returned to Paris, and a few years later married Señor de Rute, a Spaniard whom she also outlived.

Her writings consists of miscellaneous sketches, verses, plays, and novels, such as Si j'etais reine (1868) and Les marriages de la créole (1866), reprinted under the title La chanteuse (1870).

[edit] Literature

  • Grierson, Parisian Portraits (New York, 1913)