“A great Norman, so in love with Bois-Héroult”

“It was a grand Normandso in love with Bois-Héroult”, confides Édouard de Lamaze, to evoke his father-in-law, Gabriel de Broglie, member of the French Academy, who died on January 8, in Paris, at the age of 93. “It’s very lonely when a loved one disappears,” adds the mayor of Bois-Héroult.

Born in 1931, in Versailles, Gabriel de Broglie belongs to the younger branch of this great house of Piedmontese origin, which gave France numerous statesmen, ecclesiastics, marshals and scholars. After studying at the college of Oratorians in Pontoise, then at the Institute of Political Studies in Paris, he attended the ENA (Tocqueville class of 1960) and entered the Council of State in 1960 as a auditor, then master of requests, and councilor of state. He has been an honorary state councilor since 1999.

Member of several ministerial cabinets

Gabriel de Broglie was also a member of several ministerial offices : he was jurisconsult (legal advisor) to André Malraux (1962-1966), advisor to Jean-Marcel Jeanneney (1966-1968), Maurice Schumann (1968), Maurice Couve de Murville (1968-1969), by Édouard Michelet (1970) and André Bettencourt (1971).

Beyond this rich career alongside politicians and within French institutions, Gabriel de Broglie has also left his mark on the audiovisual landscape.

He was deputy general director of the ORTF (1971-1974), general director of Radio-France (1975-1979), president of the INA (National Audiovisual Institute). He was also appointed, by the President of the Senate, Alain Poher, to the High Audiovisual Authority (1982-1986), then to the National Commission for Communication and Liberties (1986-1989).

I have never read a book without trying to find out how it was done, with what ink and by what work. I have never written a page without seeking the help of language. Fiber of my being, perception of my senses, landscape of my activity: I experienced French as one breathes good air.

Historian, author of biographies and studies on Orleanism and the 20th century^e century, Gabriel de Broglie was also a recognized essayist, providing testimonies on the different functions he held, as well as on the French language, which he ardently defended throughout his life: “As far as I remember, I have always felt French as a fiber of my being. A large part of my pleasures and a greater part of my work has consisted in living on the resources of language, in receiving and emitting its words, in observing their fullness, their anticipation and their beauty, nourishing myself on them as a necessary and desired nourishment. expressed Gabriel de Broglie.

“I have never read a book without trying to find out how it was done, with what ink and by what work. I have never written a page without seeking the help of language. Fiber of my being, perception of my senses, landscape of my activity: I experienced French as one breathes good air,” he added.

Numerous works often awarded

The works of Gabriel de Broglie have been crowned with prizes. That of the French Academy (Political history of the Revue des Deux-Mondes from 1829 to 1979 ; Orleanism or the Liberal Resource of France, 1981), that of the Combatant Writers (The General of Valencia or Carelessness and Glory, 1973), that of the Vauban prize (French so that it lives, 1987), that of the first Grand Prix Gobert (Madame de Genlis, 1985), or by the Ambassadors’ prize (Guizot, 1991).

Elected to the Academy of Moral and Political Sciences in 1997 and to the French Academy on March 22, 2001, in the chair of Alain Peyrefitte (11th chair), Gabriel de Broglie was then elected chancellor of the Institut de France , from 2006 to 2017. Then, on March 14, 2019, he was inducted Honorary President of the French Renaissance, where he succeeded Simone Veil.

Remember that at the Bois-Héroult estate, the Gabriel de Broglie library, open to the public and which brings together 7,500 works, was inaugurated in May 2015 by Hélène Carrère d’Encausse of the Académie française.

He will be buried in the family vault, in Bois-Héroult

The funeral mass of Gabriel de Broglie will be celebrated Thursday, January 16, at 9:30 a.m., at the Sainte-Clotilde basilica, in Paris (7th arrondissement). The prince’s remains will then be transported to Bois-Héroult, where he will be buried in the family vault at 3 p.m.

Sources: Academy of Moral and Political Sciences, French Academy.

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