François-René de Chateaubriand (1768–1848)

Girodet's 1791 portrait of Chateaubriand depicts the future Romantic writer at age twenty-three—a young Breton nobleman who had not yet published anything significant and whose transformation into the founding figure of French Romanticism was still years away. The 1791 date places this at the beginning of both men's careers: Girodet had just triumphed at the Salon with Endymion, and Chateaubriand was preparing to leave for America on the journey that would eventually produce Atala. The portrait's combination of youthful intensity and introspection suggests the psychological acuity Girodet brought to all his portraiture, and the subsequent famous nature of the sitter has given this early image a historical significance it did not originally possess.

The young Chateaubriand's features are rendered with the direct observation appropriate to a life portrait, before the more iconic treatments that later fame would encourage. Girodet's technique at this early career stage already shows the precision and sensitivity that would characterize his mature portraits. The composition is relatively simple, focusing on the young man's face and expression.