The Lycée Voltaire is a secondary school in
Paris
Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, largest city of France. With an estimated population of 2,048,472 residents in January 2025 in an area of more than , Paris is the List of ci ...
, France, established in 1890.
History
The Lycée Voltaire was the first ''lycée'' in the east of Paris, and was intended to supplement classical humanities with practical and scientific knowledge suitable for the needs of the neighborhood.
The building was officially inaugurated on 13 July 1891 in a ceremony attended by
Marie François Sadi Carnot, president of the Republic.
For a long time it was the only lycée in the northeast of Paris.
There were 152 students in the first year, 544 in 1904 and 792 in 1912.
A major renovation was undertaken from 1992 to 2002.
The lycée today is a public secondary school for general education and technology.
Building
Eugène Train (1832–1903) was architect of the Lycée Voltaire, which was located on the Avenue de la République. Construction began in 1885.
The school was designed to accommodate 1,200 pupils, of whom 500 were boarders.
Construction was completed in September 1890.
The cost was divided between the state and the city of Paris.
The buildings are arranged around a central courtyard, courtyards to the east and west, and to the north a courtyard for physical education and sports.
Buildings included 47 classrooms and 17 studies, lecture rooms for physics (2), chemistry (2), history & geography (2).
There is a collections room, drawing room, modeling workshops and a library.
A screening room was equipped by M. Gaumont.
The building includes four large apartments for senior staff and accommodation for 20 teachers and 20 domestic workers.
The decorations of the building included metal and ceramics.
A marble monument of Voltaire by
Victor Ségoffin, meant for the Pantheon, now stands in the courtyard of the Lycee Voltaire.
File:Avant-projet lycee Voltaire-Eugene Train-IMG 8152.JPG, Drawing by Eugène Train
File:Lycée Voltaire Paris Cour d'honneur.jpg, Cour d'honneur
File:Photo de classe vers 1920-1930.jpg, Class photo
Former pupils
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Octave Aubry (1881–1946), novelist and historian
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Yves Boisset
Yves Félix Claude Boisset (14 March 1939 – 31 March 2025) was a French film director and screenwriter.
Early life
Boisset was born 14 March 1939, in Paris, France. He studied at the Institut des hautes études cinématographiques (IDHEC). ...
(born 1939), film director
*
Fernand Braudel
Fernand Paul Achille Braudel (; 24 August 1902 – 27 November 1985) was a French historian. His scholarship focused on three main projects: ''The Mediterranean'' (1923–49, then 1949–66), ''Civilization and Capitalism'' (1955–79), and the un ...
(1902–85), historian
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Edgar Faure (1908–88), politician
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Alain-Fournier (1886–1914), author
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Henri Krasucki (1924–2003), trade-unionist
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Camille Le Tallec (1906–91), porcelain artist
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Marcel L'Herbier
Marcel L'Herbier (; 23 April 1888 – 26 November 1979) was a French filmmaker who achieved prominence as an avant-garde theorist and imaginative practitioner with a series of silent films in the 1920s. His career as a director continued unti ...
(1888–1979), filmmaker
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André Michel Lwoff
André Michel Lwoff (8 May 1902 – 30 September 1994) was a French microbiologist and Nobel laureate.
Education, early life and career
Lwoff was born in Ainay-le-Château, Allier, in Auvergne, France, into a Jewish family of Russian-Polish or ...
(1902–94), microbiologist
*
Aïssa Maïga
Aïssa Maïga (born 5 May 1975) is a Senegal-born French actress, director, writer, producer, and activist. Maïga has worked with major auteurs like Michael Haneke, Abderrahmane Sissako and Michel Gondry, and recently starred in Chiwetel Ejio ...
(born 1975), actress
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Guy Marchand (born 1937), actor, musician and singer
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Jean Mermoz (1901–36), aviator
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Claude Miller (1942– 2012), filmmaker
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Gilbert Montagné
Gilbert Montagné (; born 28 December 1951) is a French singer, musician, pianist and organist from the Ménilmontant neighbourhood of Paris and Bourbonnais historical region of central France. Blind since shortly after birth, he is best known ...
(born 1951), musician
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Violette Nozière (1915–66), parricide
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Jacques Revaux (born 1940), songwriter
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Sagamore Stévenin (born 1974), actor
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Julie Zenatti (born 1981), singer
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Robinson Stévenin (born 1981), actor
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Alan Stivell
Alan Stivell (; born Alan Cochevelou on 6 January 1944) is a Breton people, Breton and Celtic musician and singer, songwriter, recording artist, and master of the Celtic harp. From the early 1970s, he revived global interest in the Celtic (specif ...
(born 1944), musician
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Guy Stroumsa (born 1948), professor of comparative religion
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Pedro Winter (born 1975), music producer
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Serge Daney (1944 - 1992), film critic
Former teachers
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Jean-Louis Bory
Jean-Louis Bory (25 June 1919 – 11/12 June 1979) was a French writer, journalist, and film critic.
Life
Jean-Louis Bory was born on 25 June 1919 in Méréville, Essonne.
The son of a pharmacist and a teacher, he came from a family of teach ...
(1919–79), writer, journalist and film critic
*
Alain Krivine (born 1941), Trotskyist politician
*
Albert Malet (1864–1915), historian
*
Robert Mandrou (1921–84), historian
*
Jules Marouzeau (1878–1964), philologist
*
Émile Moselly (1870–1918), novelist.
*
Étienne Weill-Raynal
Étienne Weill-Raynal (1887–1982) was a French historian, resistant, journalist and Socialist politician. As a scholar following World War I, he specialized in the subject of reparations. When World War II began, he was dismissed from his teach ...
(1887–1982), historian
Notes
Sources
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{{DEFAULTSORT:
Lycées in Paris
Buildings and structures in the 11th arrondissement of Paris
Educational institutions established in 1890
1890 establishments in France