Michel Dieulafoy

Joseph-Marie-Armand-Michel Dieulafoy (1762, Toulouse – 13 December 1823) was a French librettist and playwright.

In his relatives, owners of large properties in the colonies drew him to the New World, and he moved to Santo Domingo where fortunate speculations already promised him a brilliant fortune.

But the upheaval and emancipation of the Haitian Revolution destroyed his hopes: his house was burned down and his plantations were devastated by those who had formerly been enslaved there.

He escaped the massacre du Cap in 1793 and fled to Philadelphia where he stayed there for a while, then returned to France where he devoted himself to dramatic poetry, mainly the vaudeville genre.

The Théâtre du Vaudeville (which was then located rue de Chartres) saw his success since 1798, that is to say at the time of his greatest vogue.