LYCOS RETRIEVER 
Hector Berlioz: Harriet Smithson
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Berlioz did not understand any English, but he went to a performance of Shakespeare’s Hamlet given by an English theatre company. The actress taking the part of Ophelia was called Harriet Smithson. Berlioz fell passionately in love with her, although he did not know her, and started following her about everywhere. In the end he married her. The marriage was not a success. Berlioz was really in love with Ophelia, the character from Shakespeare’s play.
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During this time Berlioz’s personal life was not entirely happy. He had married Smithson in 1833, but she drank heavily and the marriage was soon troubled. The two separated in the early 1840s, and after Smithson’s death in 1854 Berlioz married singer Marie Recio, who died in 1862. In addition, his music failed to achieve popular or critical success in France. To support himself, he wrote musical criticism for the periodical Journal des Débats from 1835 until 1863. He supplemented his income by serving as librarian of the Paris Conservatory from 1838 on. He ... turned to conducting.
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In 1854 Harriet Smithson died and seven months later Berlioz married Marie Recio, a singer he had known for 12 years. Her Spanish mother came to live with them, and she looked after Berlioz very kindly in his last years when he was ill. Berlioz’ son Louis had become a captain in the navy and travelled all over the world. This was something Berlioz had always dreamt of doing since his childhood when he used to read travel books. Berlioz was terribly sad in 1867 when he heard that Louis had died in Havana of yellow fever.
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In the meantime, after an unhappy attempt to communicate his affections to Harriett Smithson, Berlioz turned to the pianist Marie Mok and proposed marriage to her. He left for Rome early in 1831 for a 2-year stay at the Villa Medici, promising to return at the end of that time to marry Marie. A little later he learned that she had married someone else and decided to rush to Paris to kill her and then himself. He changed his mind after getting as far as Nice and turned back to Rome.
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A footnote, sadly unromantic: Berlioz eventually was able to get Harriett Smithson’s attention. She was apparently charmed to discover the lengths that he had gone to express his feelings for her, and they married before long. Alas for happy endings—the marriage that was consummated in such a romantic haze fell crashing apart on the hard rocks of reality. Within a few years they discovered that they were miserable together; they separated in 1844. Immediately after Harriet’s death in 1854, Berlioz married Marie Recio, his mistress of many years.
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Harriet Smithson