Abstract
Whether in person or in the guise of some fictional character, the figure of Eugène-François Vidocq appears regularly in the literature of the nineteenth century. In the present article, I study the figure's literary posterity and examines how the ex-convict who rose to the rank of chief of police was treated by some French and English authors of the time, including Jerrold, Balzac and Collins. By doing so I establish the various processes involved in the making of a legend and explore the different stages in the development of the adventurer as a social type in the nineteenth century.
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