G. Lenotre

Writing under the pen name G. Lenotre, Louis Léon Théodore Gosselin was a French historian and playwright born in 1855 at Richemont in Moselle and died in Paris in 1935. He became especially associated with books on the French Revolution, above all the years of the Terror, and was also known for his fascination with old Paris and its forgotten corners.

He wrote for major French periodicals, including Le Figaro, Revue des deux mondes, Le Monde illustré, and Le Temps. What made his work stand out was his habit of building narratives from primary documents and archives, which gave his historical writing a strong sense of place and detail while keeping it lively for general readers.

Alongside his historical books, he also wrote for the theater. Late in life, he was elected to the Académie française, a sign of the esteem he had earned in French literary and historical circles.