Alphonse Royer

Alphonse Royer, (10 September 1803 – 11 April 1875) was a French author, dramatist and theatre manager, most remembered today for having written (with his regular collaborator, Gustave Vaëz) the librettos for Gaetano Donizetti's opera La favorite and Giuseppe Verdi's Jérusalem. From 1853 to 1856, he was the director of the Odéon Theatre and from 1856 to 1862 director of the Paris Opéra, after which he was appointed France's Inspecteur Général des Beaux-Arts (Inspector General for the Fine Arts). In his later years, he wrote a six volume history of the theatre and a history of the Paris Opéra. He also translated the theatrical works of the Italian dramatist Carlo Gozzi, as well those of the Spanish writers, Cervantes, Tirso de Molina, and Juan Ruiz de Alarcón. A Chevalier and later Officier of the Légion d'honneur, Royer died in Paris, the city of his birth, at the age of 71.