Gustave Doré was a French illustrator, engraver, painter and sculptor, born in Strasbourg in January 1832.

When he was a child, his talent didn’t go unnoticed: he was a brilliant student, but also a very good caricaturist. He was twelve when he first got published by a local. His lithographs about the Labours of Hercules drew the attention of a publisher in Paris, Charles Philipon, who invited him to come live in Paris.

He studied there at the Lycée Charlemagne, drawing caricatures for Le Journal pour rire published by Philipon. He rapidly became famous but still lived with his mother after the death of his father in 1849. After 1851, he sculped several pieces with religious themes and also participated to several magazines, including Le Journal pour Tous.

In 1854, Joseph Bry published Rabelais' work, illustrated by hundreds of Doré's engravings. From 1861 to 1868, he illustrated Dante's Divine Comedy.

During his life, Doré only got more and more recognition for his work as both a self-taught man and an extrovert person, he illustrated more than a hundred and twenty books that were published in France, England, Germany and even Russia.