L'Esercito dei Romantici: ARTE.TV animated series on 19th-century Paris

ARTE.TV has released 'L'Esercito dei Romantici', a four-part animated documentary series exploring Paris's Romantic era from 1830 to 1871. The series features key figures such as Victor Hugo, George Sand, Nadar, Hector Berlioz, Frédéric Chopin, Eugène Delacroix, Gustave Courbet, Charles Baudelaire, Alexandre Dumas, Honoré de Balzac, Alphonse de Lamartine, and Théophile Gautier. It begins with Delacroix's 1827 painting 'The Death of Sardanapalus' and covers literary works like Hugo's 'Hernani', Balzac's 'La Peau de chagrin', and Berlioz's 'Symphonie fantastique'. The narrative intertwines cultural ferment with political upheavals: the July Revolution deposing Charles X, the rise of Louis-Philippe, Hugo's election to the Académie française, Dumas's theater inauguration, Balzac's 'Comédie humaine' project, the February 1848 Revolution, Lamartine proclaiming the Republic, the election of Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte as Emperor Napoleon III, and the subsequent exile of Hugo and Dumas. The final episode follows the exiles' return after Napoleon III's defeat, with Hugo hailed as a hero alongside Sand, Gautier, and Dumas witnessing the triumph of the Republic. ARTE.TV, active in Italy since 2008, offers the series in six languages as part of its cultural streaming platform.