One of the most famous French writers of the 19th century, best known for the historical novels The Three Musketeers and The Count of Monte Cristo, both written within the space of two years, 1844-45. Dumas was among the first, along with Honoré de Balzac and Eugène Sue, who fully used the possibilities of roman feuilleton, the serial novel. Dumas' works are fast-paced adventure tales, which belong  to the foundation works of popular culture.

"Tell me, the first time you tasted oysters, tea, porter, truffels, and sundry other dainties which you now adore, did you like them? Could you comprehend how the Romans stuffed their pheasants with assafœtida, and the Chinese eat swallows' nests? Eh? no! Well, it is the same with hashish; only eat for a week and nothing in the world will seem to you to equal the delicacy of its flavor, which now appears to you flat and distasteful. Let us now go into the adjoining chamber, which is your apartment, and Ali will bring us coffee and pipes." (in The Count of Monte Cristo)

Alexandre Dumas was born in Villes-Cotterêts, France. His grandfather was a French nobleman, who had settled in Santo Domingo; his paternal grandmother, Marie-Cessette, was an Afro-Caribbean, who had been a black slave in the French colony. Dumas' father was a general in Napoleon's army, who had fallen out of favor. After his death in 1806, the family lived in poverty. Dumas worked as a notary's clerk in Villers-Cotterêtes and went in 1823 to Paris to find work. Due to his elegant handwriting he secured a position with the Duc d'Orléans - later King Louis Philippe. He also found his place in theater and as a publisher of some obscure magazines. An illegitimate son called Alexandre Dumas fils, whose mother, Marie-Catherine Labay, was a dressmaker, was born in 1824.

Dumas was an omnivorous reader. Especially he was interested in plays. His first produced drama was La Chasse et l'Amour, written with with Adolphe de Leuven and P.J. Rosseau. It opened on September 22, 1835 at Théâtre de l'Ambigu-Comique. As a playwright Dumas made his breakthrough with Henri III et sa Cour (1829), produced by the Comédie-Française. The romantic tale about power and love was set in the Renessaince court of Henry III and drew on Louis-Pierre Anquetil's Histoire de France and Pierre de L'Estoile's Memoires-journaux. Its success prompted Dumas to continue with additional plays, of which La Tour de Nesle (1832, The Tower of Nesle) is considered the greatest masterpiece of French melodrama. It was written in collaboration with Frédéric Gaullardet. The action centeres around the doomed Queen Marguerite de Bourgogne, who has ordered her illegitimate sons to be killed, but who appears into her life twenty years later. Mademoiselle de Belle-Isle (1839) had 500 performances.

From the beginning, Dumas' abilities as a writer were under dispute, but he is fully credited with revitalizing the historical novel in France. Being able to write 14 hours a day, Dumas produced a steady stream of plays, novels, and short stories. Before 1843 he had already created fifteen plays. Historical novels brought Dumas an enormous fortune, but he could spent money faster than he made it. He produced some 250 books with his 73 assistants, especially with the history teacher Auguste Maquet, whom he wisely allowed to work quite independently. However, Dumas rewrote everything with his own hand. Whatever he read or heard he could remember it. His works were not faithful to the historical facts, but blend skillfully history and fiction. Once at a gathering, in which Dumas described the battle of Waterloo, a general complained, "but it wasn't like that; I was there!" This prompted Dumas to reply, "you were not paying attention to what was going on."

Dumas earned roughly 200,000 francs yearly and received an annual sum of 63,000 francs for 220,000 lines from the newspapers La Presse and the Constitutionel. Maquet often proposed subjects and wrote first drafts for some of Dumas' most famous serial novels, including Les Trois Mousquetaires (1844, The Three Musketeers), originally serialized in Le Siècle between March and July of 1844, and  Le Comte de Monte-Cristo (1844-45, The Count of Monte-Cristo). Dix ans plus tard ou le Vicomte de Bragelonne first appeated in Le Siècle from 1847 to 1850, and was then published in three volumes, The Vicomte de Bragelonne, Louise de la Vallière, and The Man in the Iron Mask.

The Count of Monte-Cristo originated from Dumas' acquaintance with Jérôme Bonaparte, Napoléon Bonaparte's brother, whose younger son Dumas took occasionally on short educational journeys. Returning from Elba, Dumas spotted another island, the deserted Monte-Carlo, about which he determined to write a novel in remembrance of the trip. The protagonist of the novel, Edmond Dantès, is about to marry his sweetheart and become a captain of a vessel. He is framed by three enemies as a Napoleonic conspirator, shortly before Napoleon's dramatic return from Elba in 1815. Dantès is imprisoned in the Chateau d'If, by the politician Villefort, who is anxious to conceal his own father's machinations on behalf of Bonaparte. Educated by the Abbé Faria, Dantés remains in the French Alcatraz 14 years, before he manages to escape, in a highly dramatic manner. He flees to the island of Monter Cristo, and locates a fabulous treasure, hidden since the time of Renaissance. As the Count of Monte Cristo and with the wealth of the treasure, Dantès destroys his enemies and shows the wrong side of the bourgeois world. "Let it be as you wish, my sweet angel' said the Count. 'God has sustained me against my enemies and I see now He does not wish me to end my triumph with repentance. I intended punishing myself, but God has pardoned me! Love me, Haydee! Who knows? Perhaps your love will help me to forget all I do not wish to remember! Come, Haydee!" (in The Count of Monte Cristo) . Dumas based the story of Edmond Dantès partly on the life of a poor shoemaker named François Picaud.

As a master dialogist, Dumas developed character traits, and kept the action moving, and composed the all-important chapter endings - teaser scenes that maintained suspense and readers interest to read more. Dumas himself claimed that he only began writing his books when they were already completed in his head.

The chatacters of the three musketeers have inspired many filmmakers, although the story itself was problematic for American film directors for some decades due to Hollywood's Production Code: d'Artagnan is in love with a married woman, Constance, and has a relationship with Milady de Winter, who actually is Athos' wife, and he feels attraction to Milady's maid, Kitty, whose passionate glances he doesn't first notice. "Then only D'Artagnan remembered the languishing glances of Kitty, her constantly meeting him in the antechamber, the corridor, or on the stairs, those touches of the hand every time she met him, and her deep sighs; but absorbed by his desire to please the great lady, he had disdained the soubrette. He whose game is the eagle takes no heed of the sparrow."

"All for one, one for all, that is our device." (in The Three Musketeers)

The adventures of the King's Musketeers, the faithful defenders of the monarchy, continued in Twenty Years After, The Vicomte de Bragelonne, Louise de la Vallière, and The Man in the Iron Mask, based on the legend of Louis XIV's twin brother, Philippe, which also had inspired Voltaire and Victor Hugo's play Les Jumeaux (1839). According to the legend, the face of Philippe, imprisoned in Bastille, was covered with an iron mask to hide his true identity. He was "clothed in black and masked by a visor of polished and steel soldered to a helmet of the same nature, which altogether enveloped his whole head. The fire of the heavens cast red reflections upon the polished surface, and these reflections, flying off capriciously, seemed to be angry looks launched by this unfortunate..." At the end, Dumas' heroes die romantically in different battles - Porthos is killed by king's men, d'Artagnan is killed in Holland by a stray bullet. Only Aramis manages to stay alive.

Dumas' role in the development of the historical novel owes much to a coincidence. The lifting of press censorship in the 1830s gave rise to a rapid spread of newspapers. Editors began to lure readers by entertaining serial novels. Everybody read them, the aristocracy, and the bourgeoisie, young and old, men and women. Dumas' first true serial novel was Le Capitaine Paul (1838, Captain Paul), a quick rewrite of a play. It was addressed to a female readership and added 5,000 subscribers to the list of Le Siècle, when it was serialized. Along with Balzac and other writers, he also contributed to Emile de Girardin's weekly, La Mode, which became the voice of an aristocratic and wordly tout-Paris.

Dumas lived as adventurously as the heroes of his books, and his way of life created a number of anecdotes. When he was asked to contribute 25 francs to bury a bailiff he gave 50 francs and said: "There you are - bury two of them." He took part in the revolution of July 1830 and became a captain in the National Guard, caught cholera during the epidemic of 1832, and traveled in Italy to recuperate. He married in 1840 his mistress Ida Ferrier, an actress, but he soon separated after having spent her entire dowry. With the money earned from his writings, he built a fantastic château de Monte-Cristo on the outskirts of Paris.

In 1850 Dumas published The Black Tulip, a romantic adventure set in the 17th century Holland. In the middle of the political struggle for freedom is Cornelius van Baerle, a young man who has devoted himself to tulip-growing. Like Edmund Dantés, Cornelius is falsely imprisoned. With the help of Rosa, the daughter of a jailer, he manages to grow a black tulip. Cornelius wins his freedom and hundred thousand guilders in glittering gold pieces as reward for the tulip. "This tulip," continued the Prince, "will therefore bear the name of its producer, and figure in the catalogue under the title, Tulipa nigra Rosa Barlaensis, because of the name Van Baerle, which will henceforth be the name of this damsel."

In 1851 Dumas escaped his creditors to Brussels, and thus avoided sharing the fate of Dates or Cornelius. He spent two years in exile and then returned to Paris and founded a daily paper called Le Mousquetaire. In 1858 he traveled to Russia and in1860 he went to Italy, where he supported Garibaldi and Italy's struggle for independence (1860-64). He then remained in Naples as a keeper of the museums for four years. On his return to France Dumas' debts continued to mount.

Called as "the king of Paris", Dumas earned fortunes and spent them right away on friends, art, and mistresses. He was professed to have had dozens of illegitimate children, but he acknowledged only three. According to a story, when Dumas once found his wife in bed with his good friend Roger de Beauvoir, he said: "It's cold night. Move over and make room for me." Dumas died of a stroke on December 5, 1870, at Puys, near Dieppe. It is claimed that his last words were: "I shall never know how it all comes out now," in which he referred to his unfinished book. Dumas' son Alexandre Dumas fils, became a writer, dramatist, and moralist; he never accepted his father's lifestyle. Noteworthy, Dumas' love stories were included in the Vatican index of forbidden books.

Dumas did not generally define himself as a black man, and there is not much evidence that he encountered overt racism during his life. However, his works were popular among the 19th-century African-Americans, partly because in The Count of Monte-Cristo, the struggle of Edmond Dantès may be read as a parable of emancipation. In a shorter work, Georges (1843, George), Dumas examined the question of race and colonialism. The main character, a half-French mulatto, leaves Mauritius to be educated in France, and returns to avenge himself for the affronts he had suffered as a boy.

Dumas' central works created a romantic fictional history of France, but they also had supernatural elements and characters, that preceded the superheroes of the 20th-century. These stories include Le Château d'Eppstein (1844), a ghost tale, Les frères corses (1844), where Siamese twins, separated at birth, maintain a psychic knowledge of each other's dire fates, Isaac Laquedem (1853), based on the legend of the Wandering Jew, and Le Meneur de Loups (1857), where a young man agrees a pact with the Devil. His play, Le Vampire (1851), was a Byronic vampire tale.

For further reading: Alexandre Dumas pére by Hippolyte Parigot (1902); The Fourth Musketeer by J. Lucas-Dubreton (1928); The Laughing Mulatto by R. Todd (1940); Alexandre Dumas by A.C. Bell (1950); Alexandre Dumas: A Great Life in Brief  by André Maurois (1955); The Titans by André Maurois (1957); The Life and Writings of Alexandre Dumas by Harry A. Spurr (1972); Alexandre Dumas père et la Comèdie Française by F. Bassan and S. Chevalley (1972); Alexandre Dumas (père) by Richard S. Stowe (1976); Alexandre Dumas by F.W.J. Hemmings (1979); 'Missing' Works of Alexandre Dumas, Pere by Douglas Munro (1983); Alexandre Dumas: Genius of Life by Claude Schopp (1989); General Alexandre Dumas: Soldier of the French Revolution by John G. Gallaher (1997) - Museum: Chateau de Montecristo, 1 avenue Kennedy, 78560 Port-Marly, Yvelines - home of Alexandre Dumas, where he wrote The Three Musketeers and The Count of Monte-Cristo; Musée Alexandre Dumas, 24 rue Démoustier, 02600 Villes-Citterêts - museum devoted to Alexandre Dumas and Alexandre Dumas fils.

Selected works:

• Ivanhoe, 1822? (play)
• La Chasse et l’Amour, 1825 (play, with Adolphe de Leuven and P.J. Rosseau)
• La Noce et l’Enterrement, 1826 (play)
• Nouvelles contemporaines, 1826
• Fiesque de Lavagna, 1827 (based on Friedrich Schiller's Fiesco)
• Henri III et sa cour, 1829 (play)
• Christine, ou Stockholm, Fontainebleau et Rome , 1830
• Napoléon Bonaparte ou Trente Ans de l’Histoire de France, 1831 (play)
• Antony, 1831 (play)
• Richard Darlington, 1831 (play, with Dinaux)
• Charles VII chez ses grands vassaux, 1831 (play)
• La Tour de Nesle, 1832 (play, with Frédéric Gaillardet) - The Tower of Nesle (tr. Henry Llewellyn Williams, 1904; Adam L. Gowans, 1906; Edwin Stanton De Poncet, 1934)
• Madame et la Vendée, 1832
• Téresa, 1832 (play, with Anicet Bourgeois)
• Le fils de l'émigré, 1832 (play, with Anicet Bourgeois)
• Le mari de la veuve, 1832 (play, with Anicet Bourgeois and Eugène Durieu)
• Gaule et France, 1833
• Angèle, 1833 (play, with Anicet Bourgeois)
• La Vendée et Madame, 1833 - The Duchess of Berri in La Vendée (tr. 1833)
• Impressions de voyage: En Suisse , 1833-37 (5 vols.) - Glacier Land (tr. W.R. Kilds, 1852) / Adventures in Switzerland (tr. 1960)
• La Venitienne, 1834 (play, with Anicet Bourgeois)
• Catherine Howard, 1834 (play) - Catherine Howard (tr. 1859)
• Impressions de voyage: France, 1835-37 - Pictures of Travel in the South of France (tr. 1852)
• Souvenirs d’Anthony, 1835 - The Recollections of Antony (tr. Jeremy Griswold, 1849) / The Reminiscences of Anthony (tr. 1905)
• Cromwell et Charles I, 1835 (play, with M.-E.-G. Théaulon de Lambert and E. Rousseau)
• Kean, 1836 (play) - Edmund Kean (tr. 1847)
• Le Marquis de Brunoy, 1836 (play, with others)
• Guelfes et gibelins, 1836 - Guelphs and Ghibellines (tr. 1905)
• Isabel de Bavière, 1836 - Isabel of Bavaria (tr. William Barrow,1846)
• Caligula, 1837 (play)
• Piquillo, 1837 (play, with Gérard de Nerval)
• La Salle d’armes, 1838 (includes Pauline, Pacal Bruno, Murat), 1838 - Pascal Bruno (tr. 1837); The Sicilian Bandit (tr. 1859); Pauline (tr. 1844) - Kuollut maailmalta (suom. Aukusti Simojoki, 1921)
• Le Capitaine Paul, 1838 (2 vols., with Adrien Dauzats) - Paul Jones (tr. Williams Berger, 1839) / Captain Paul (tr. Thomas Williams, 1846) /  Paul Jones: A Nautical Romance (Henry Llewellyn Williams, 1889)
• Le Bourgeois de Gand, 1838 (play, with Hippolyte Romand)
• La Main droite du Sire de Giac, 1838 - The King's Favorite (tr. 1906)
• Mademoiselle de Belle-Isle, 1839 (play) - The Lady of Belle Isle (tr.  J.M. Gully, 1872) / Gabrielle de Belle Isle (tr. 1880) / The Great Lover (tr. 1979)
• Acté, 1839 (2 vols.) - Acté (tr. Henry William Herbert, 1847; Alfred Allinson, 1904)
• Bathilde, 1839 (play, with Auguste Maquet)
• L'Alchimiste, 1839 (play, with Gérard de Nerval) - The Alchemist (tr. Henry Bertram Lister, 1940)
• Léo Burckart, 1839 (play, with Gérard de Nerval)
• Crimes célèbres, 1839-1841 (4 vols., with others) - Celebrated Crimes (tr. 1843; I.G. Burnham, 1887) / The Celebrated Crimes of History (tr. 1895)  
• La Comtesse de Salisbury, 1839 - The Countess of Salisbury (tr. 1851)
• Monseigneur Gaston Phoebus, 1839
• Quinze jours au Sinaï, 1839 (2 vols.) - Voyage au Orient, and Le Sinai (tr. 1839) / Travelling Sketches in Egypt and Sinai (tr. 1839)
• Jarvis l'honnête homme ou le Marchand de Londres, 1840 (play, with Charles Lafont)
• Mémoires d'un maître d'armes: ou dix-huit mois à St.-Pétersbourg, 1840 - The Fencing-Master (tr. G. Griswold, 1850)
• Aventures de John Davys, 1840 (4 vols.)
• Maître Adam le calabrais, 1840
• Othon, l’archer, 1840 - Otho the Archer (tr. 1860)
• Napoléon, 1840 - Napoleon (tr.  John B. Larner, 1894)
• Le Capitaine Pamphile, 1840 - Captain Pamphile (tr. 1850) / The Adventures of Captain Pamphile (tr. Alfred Allinson, 1905)
• Les Stuarts, 1840 (2 vols.)
• Praxède, 1841
• La Chasse au Chastre, 1841 - The Bird of Fate (tr. 1906)
• Un mariage sous Louis XV, 1841 (play) - A Marriage of Convenience (tr. Sydney Grundy, 1897)
• Excursions sur les bords du Rhin, 1841
• Jeannic le Breton, ou Le gérant responsible, 1841 (play, with Eugène Bourgeois)
• Une année à Florence, 1841 (2 vols.)
• Midi de la France, 1841 (3 vols.; Nouvelles impressiones de voyage)
• Le séducteur et le mari, 1842 (with Charles Lafont)
• Halifax, 1842 (play, with Adolphe d'Ennery)
• Lorenzino, 1842 (play)
• Aventures de Lydéric, grand-forestier de Flandre, 1842 - Lyderic, Count of Flanders (tr. 1903) / Adventures of Lyderic (tr. 1981)
• Jeanne la pucelle, 1842 - Joan the Heroic Maiden (tr. 1847)
• Le Speronare, 1842 (4 vols.) - The Speronara (tr. Katharine Prescott Wormeley, 1902)
• Le Capitaine Arena, 1842 (2 vols.) - Captain Marion (tr. F.W. Reed, 1949)
• Le Corricolo, 1843 (4 vols.) - Sketches of Naples (tr. A. Roland, 1845)
• La Villa Palmieri, 1843 (2 vols.)
• Filles, Lorettes et Courtisanes, 1843
• Albine, 1843 (as Le Château d'Eppstein, 1844) - The Spectre Mother (tr. 1864) / The Castle of Eppstein (tr. Alfred Allinson, 1903)
• Les Demoiselles de Saint-Cyr, 1843 (play) - The Ladies of Saint-Cyr (tr. 1870)
• Le Laird de Dumbicky, 1843 (play, with Adolphe de Leuven and Léon Lhérie)
• Louise Bernard, 1843 (play, with Adolphe de Leuven and Léon Lhérie)
• Le Chevalier d'Harmental, 1843 (with Auguste Maquet) - The Chevalier d'Harmental (tr. P.F. Christin and Eugene Lies, 1846) / The Chateau d'Harmental (tr. 1856) / The Orange Plume (tr. Henry L. Williams, Jr., 1860) / The Conspirators (tr. 1910) - Ritari D'Harmental (suom. V. Hämeen-Anttila, 1934) / Rakkaus voittaa (suom. V. Hämeen-Anttila, 1934)
• Georges, 1843 - George (tr. G.J. Knox, 1846; Samuel Spring, 1847) / Georges (tr. Alfred Allinson, 1904)
• Ascanio, 1843-44 - Ascanio (tr.  Eugene Lies and Eugene Plunkett, 1846) /  Francis I (tr. 1849)
• Amayry, 1844 - Amaury (tr. 1854)
• Une âme à naître, 1844
• Cécile ou la Robe de noces, 1844 (as La Robe de noces, 1844) - Cecile (tr. Eugene Plunkett, 1847; Alfred Allinson, 1904) /  The Wedding Dress (tr. Fayette Robinson, 1851) - Morsiuspuku (suom. G.C., 1913)
• Fernande, 1844 - Fernande (tr. 1904; A. Craig Bell, 1988)
• Une fille du Régent, 1844 (with Auguste Maquet) - The Regent's Daughter (tr. Charles H. Town, 1845)
• Trois maîtres, 1844
• Gabriel Lambert, 1844 - The Galley Slave (tr. 1849) / Gabriel Lambert (tr. 1904)
• Invraisemblance, 1844
• Sylvandire, 1844 (with Auguste Maquet) - Sylvandire (tr. Thomas Williams, 1847) / The Disputed Inheritance (tr. 1847) / The Young Chevalier (tr. 1850) / Beau Tancrede (tr. 1861) 
• Louis XIV et son siècle, 1844-45 (2 vols.)
• Les frères corses, 1844 - The Corsican Brothers (tr. 1845;  Gerardus van Dam, 2nd ed., 1883;  Alfred Allinson, 1904) - Korsikan veljekset (suom. Hanna Blomqvist, 1901) - films: 1920, dir. Colin Campbell, Louis J. Gasnier; Frères corses, 1939, dir. Géo Kelber; 1941, dir. Gregory Ratoff, starring Douglas Fairbanks Jnr, Akim Tamiroff; Los hermanos corsos, 1955, dir. Leo Fleider; I fratelli Corsi, 1961, dir. Anton Giulio Majano
• Les Trois Mousquetaires, 1844 (with Auguste Maquet) - The Three Guardsmen (tr. Park Benjamin, 1846) / The Three Musketeers (tr. William Barrow, 1846; William Robson, 1860; Henry Llewellyn Williams, 1892; A. Curtis Bond, 1894; Alfred Allinson, 1903; Philip Schuyler Allen, 1923; J. Walker McSpadden, 1926; Jacques Le Clercq, 1950; Isabel Ely Lord, 1952;  Lord Sudley, 1952;  Marcus Clapham and Clive Reynard, 1992; new translation by Richard Pevear, 2006) - Kolme muskettisoturia (suom.: P.J. Hannikainen, 1889; Juho Jäykkä & Eemil Forsgren, 1895-96; Lauri Hirvensalo, 1939; Yrjö Korhonen, 1947; Marjatta Salonen, 1969; Anna Louhivuori, 1978) - filmed several times: 1914, dir. Charles V. Henkel; D'Artagnan, 1916, dir.  Charles Swickard; 1921, dir. Fred Niblo; Les Trois Mousquetaires, 1921-22, dir. Henri Diamant Berger; The Three Mut-Get-Theres, 1922, dir.  Max Linder; 1935, dir. Rowland V. Lee; 1939, dir. Allan Dwan; 1948, dir.  George Sidney, starring Gene Kelly; 1974-75, dir.  Richard Lester, screenplay by George MacDonald Fraser; 1993, dir. Stephen Herek; 2001, The Musketeer, dir.  Peter Hyams, starring Justin Chambers, Stephen Rea, Tim Roth, Mena Suvari, Catherine Deneuve; 2005, dir. Janis Cimermanis; 2005, dir. Pierre Aknine, starring Vincent Elbaz, Emmanuelle Béart and Tchéky Karyo; 2011, dir. Paul W.S. Anderson. starring Logan Lerman, Matthew Macfadyen, Ray Stevenson, Luke Evans, Milla Jovovich, Orlando Bloom 
• La Reine Margot, 1845 (with Auguste Maquet) - Margaret de Navarre (tr. 1845) / Queen Margot (tr. 1885) / Marguerite de Valois (tr. 1846; S. Fowler Wright, 1947) - Kuningatar Margot (suom. Emil Viktor Petterson, 1897; J. Maanpää, 1949) / Herttuattaren rakkaus (suom. J. Maanpää, 1949)  / Pariisin verihäät (suom. A. Somersalo, 1966) / Velisurmaajat (suom. A. Somersalo, 1966) - film 1994, dir. Patrice Chereau, starring Isabelle Adjani, Daniel Auteuil, Jean-Hugues Anglade, Vincent Perez
• Le Comte de Monte-Cristo, 1844-45 (with Auguste Maquet) - The Chateau d'If: A Romance (tr. Emma Hardy, 1846) / The Count of Monte Cristo (tr. Henry Llewellyn Williams, 1892; William Thiese, 1892; Steven Grant, 1990; Robin Buss, 1996) - Monte Criston kreivi (suom. Johan Arvid Saivo, 1891; Jalmari Finne, 1911-12;  Lauri Hirvensalo, 1945; Kaarlo Kurko, 1946; Marjatta Salonen & Eeva-Liisa Sallinen, 1966) - several  film adaptations: 1913, dir. Joseph A. Golden, Edwin S. Porter; A Modern Monte Cristo, 1917, dir. Eugene Moore; Monte Cristo, 1922, dir. Emmett J. Flynn, starring John Gilbert; Monte Cristo, 1929, dir. Henri Fescourt; 1934, dir. Rowland V. Lee, starring Robert Donat; El conde de Montecristo, 1942, dir. Roberto Gavaldón, Chano Urueta; 1943, dir. Robert Vernay, starring Pierre Richard-Willm, Michèle Alfa and Aimè Clariond; Le comte de Monte-Cristo, 1954, dir. Robert Vernay, starring Hean Marais; El conde de Montecristo, 1954, dir. León Klimovsky; Le comte de Monte Cristo, 1961, dir. Claude Autant-Lara; Günese giden yol, 1965, dir. Halit Refig; Padayottam, 1982, dir. Jijo Punnoose; Uznik zamka If, 1988, dir.  Georgi Yungvald-Khilkevich; television series 1998, dir. Josee Dayan, starring Gerard Depardieu, Ornella Muti; 2002, dir. Kevin Reynolds, screenplay by Jay Wolpert, Guy Pierce, James Caviezel, Dagmara Dominczyk, Richard Harris, Michael Wincott, Luis Guzman 
• Le Garde-Forestier, 1845 (play, with Adolphe de Leuven and Léon Lhérie)
• Un conte de fées, 1845 (play, with Adolphe de Leuven and Léon Lhérie)
• Sylvandire, 1845 (play, with Adolphe de Leuven and Léon Lhérie)
• Les Trois Mousquetaires, 1845 (play, with Auguste Maquet)
• Vingt ans après, 1845 (with Auguste Maquet) - Cardinal Mazarin (n.d.) / Twenty Years After (tr. William Barrow; 1846; Henry Llewellyn Williams, 1899; Alfred Allison, 1904) / Cromwell and Mazarin (1847) - Myladyn poika (suom. Eemil Forsgren, 1896-97; V. Hämeen-Anttila, 1914; Marjatta Salonen & Marjatta Beck, 1969) / Muskettisoturit seikkailevat jälleen (5. p., suom. V. Hämeen-Anttila, 1989)
• Histoire d'un casse-noisette, 1845 (2 vols.) - The Story of a Nutcracker (tr. 1846) / The History of a Nutcracker (tr. 1872) /  The Nutcracker of Nuremberg (tr. Grace Gingras, 1930)
• La bouillie de la comtesse Berthe, 1845 - The Honey-Stew of the Countess Bertha (tr. Cooke Taylor, 1846) / Good Lady Bertha's Honey Broth (tr. 1846) / The Honey Feast (tr. 1980)
• Italiens et Flamands, 1845
• Les Médicis, 1845 (2 vols.)
• La guerre des femmes, 1845-46 (with Auguste Maquet) - Nanon (tr. 1847) / The War of Women (tr.  Samuel Spring, 1850)
• Une fille du régent, 1846 (play, from the novel)
• Echec et Mat, 1846 (play, with Octave Feuillet and Paul Bocage)
• Le Chevalier de Maison-Rouge, 1846 (6 vols., with Auguste Maquet) - Marie Antoinette (tr. 1846) / Genevieve (tr. Henry Willaims Herbert, 1846) / Chateau-Rouge (tr. 1859) / The Chevalier de Maison-Rouge (tr. 1877) / The Knight of Redcastle (tr. Henry Llwellyn Williams, 1893) / The Knight of Redcastle (tr. Henry Llewellyn Williams, 1893) - Maison Rougen ritari (suom. Väinö Andelin, 1901; A. Somersalo, 1927)
• La Dame de Monsoreau, 1846 (8 vols., with Auguste Maquet) - Diana of Meridor (tr. 1846) / Chicot the Jester (tr. 1857) / La Dame de Monsoreau (tr. 1889) / Diane (tr. J. Walker McSpadden, 1926) - Kreivitär Monsorau 1-2 (suom. Erik Viktor Petterson, 1897-98) / Pyhä liiga (suom. A. Somersalo, 1931) / Narri ja munkki (2. p., suom. A. Somersalo, 1966)
• Le Bâtard de Mauléon, 1846 (with Auguste Maquet) - The Bastard of Mauleon (tr. 1849) / The Half-Brothers (1858) / The Iron Hand, or, The Knight of Mauleon (tr. 1858) / Agenor de Mauleon (tr. 1897)
li>De Paris à Cadix ou Impressions de voyage, 1848 (2 vols.) - Adventures in Spain (tr. 1959)
• Œuvres complètes, 1846-76
• Intrigue et amour: drame en 5 actes et 9 tableaux, 1847 (from a play by Schiller)
• Hamlet, prince de Danemark, 1847 (with Paul Meurice, from a play by Shakespeare)
• La reine Margot, 1847 (play, with Auguste Maquet, from the novel)
• Le Chevalier de Maison-Rouge, 1847 (play, with Auguste Maquet, from the novel) - The Chevalier de Maison-Rouge (tr. 1859)
• Catalina, 1848 (play, with Auguste Maquet)
• Œuvres complètes, 1848-1900 (286 vols.)
• Monte-Cristo, 1848 (play, with Auguste Maquet, from the novel)
• Les mille et un fantômes, 1848-51 - Tales of the Supernatural (3 vols., 1907-1909)
• Les Quarante-cinq, 1848 (with Auguste Maquet) - The Forty-Five Guardsmen (tr. 1847) / The Forty-Five (tr. J. Walker McSpadden, 1926) /  - Kosto: historiallinen romaani hugenottisotien ajoilta (suom. A. Somersalo, 1933)
• Le Véloce, ou Tanger, Alger et Tunis, 1848-51 (4 vols.) - Tales of Algeria (tr. Richard Meade Bache, 1868) / Tangier to Tunis (tr. A.E. Murch, 1959) / Adventures in Algeria (tr. 1959)
• Le Vicomte de Bragelonne; ou, Dix ans plus tard, 1848-50 (with Auguste Maquet) - The Vicomte de Bragelonne (tr. Thomas Williams, 1848) Bragelonne, the Son of Athos: or Ten Years Later (tr. Thomas Williams, 1848) / The Iron Mask (tr. Louise La Valliere, 1851; Alfred Allinson, 1904) / The Man in the Iron Mask / (tr. Henry Llwellyn Williams, 1889; Louise de la Valliere, 1892) - Bragelonnen varakreivi eli muskettisoturien viimeiset urotyöt (suom. V. Hämeen-Anttila, 1916) / Muskettisoturien viimeiset urotyöt 1-2 (suom. Marjatta Beck, 1969; V. Hämeen-Anttila, 1992-93) - films: The Iron Mask , 1929, dir. by Allan Dwan, starring Douglas Fairbanks, screenplay by Elton Thomas - Fairbanks' often used pseudonym; The Man in the Iron Mask, 1939, dir. James Whale; The Lady in the Iron Mask, 1959, dir. Ralph Murphy; The Man in the Iron Mask, 1976, dir. Mike Newell; The Fifth Musketeer, 1979, dir. Ken Annakin; The Man In the Iron Mask, 1998, dir.  Randall Wallace, starring Gabriel Byrne, John Malkovich, Jeremy Irons, Gerard Depardieu, Leonardo DiCaprio
• Le Collier de la reine, 1849 (with Auguste Maquet) - The Queen's Necklace (tr. Thomas Williams, 1850; Henry Llewellyn Williams, 1892) - Kuningattaren kaulanauha (suom. Werner Anttila, 1917)
• Ange Pitou, 1849 (with Auguste Maquet) - Six Years Later or, Taking the Bastille  (tr. Thomas Williams, 1851) / The Royal Life-Guard (tr. Henry Llewellyn Williams, 1893) / Ange Pitou (tr. 1907) - Bastiljin valloitus (suom. Jalmari Finne, 1918) / Ange Pitou (suom. Jalmari Finne, 1918)
• Le Cachemire vert, 1849 (play, with Eugène Nus)
• Le Comte Hermann, 1849 (play)
• La jeunesse des mousquetaires, 1849 (play, from the novel) - The Three Musketeers (tr. 1855) / The Musketeers (tr. 1898)
• Le chevalier d'Harmental, 1849 (play, with Auguste Maquet, from the novel)
• La guerre des femmes, 1849 (play, with Auguste Maquet, from the novel)
• Le Connétable de Bourbon ou l'Italie du seizième siècle, 1849 (play, with Eugène Grangé and Xavier de Montépin)
• Le Testament de César, 1849 (play, with Jules Lacroix)
• Louis XV et sa cour, 1849 (4 vols.)
• La Régence, 1849 (2 vols.)
• Montevideo, ou une nouvelle Troie, 1850
• Trois entractes pour l'amour médecin, 1850 (play)
• La Chasse au chastre, 1850 (play, from the novel)
• Les Chevaliers du Lansquenet, 1850 (play, with Eugène Grangé and Xavier de Montépin)
• Urbain Grandier, 1850 (play, with Auguste Maquet)
• Le Vingt-quatre février, 1850 (play)
• Le Trou de l’enfer, 1850 - The Mouth of Hell (tr. 1906)
• La Tulipe noire, 1850 - Rosa; or, The Black Tulip (tr. Franz Demmler, 1854) / The Black Tulip (A.J. O’Connor, 1902; Mary D. Frost, 1902; S.J. Adair Fitz-Gerald, 1951) - Musta tulppaani (suom. Hilja Walldén, 1913; Hertta Tirranen, 1956) - films: Das Fest der schwarzen Tulpe, 1920, dir. Marie Luise Droop, Muhsin Ertugrul; De zwarte tulp, 1921, dir. Maurits Binger, Frank Richardson; 1937, dir. Alex Bryce; TV series 1956; La tulipe noire, 1964, dir. Christian-Jaque, starring Alain Delon, Virna Lisi and Dawn Addams; TV mini-series, 1970
• Mémoires de Talma, 1850 (3 vols.)
• La Colombe, 1850 - The Dove (tr. 1906) - Kirjekyyhkynen (suom. Joel Lehtonen, 1916)
• Histoire de Louis XVI et la rèvolution, 1850-51 (3 vols.)
• Le Drame de '93, 1851-52 (7 vols.)
• Le Vampire, 1851 (play, with Auguste Maquet)
• La Barrière de Clichy, 1851 (play)
• Le Comte de Morcerf; Villefort, 1851 (play, 2 vols., with Auguste Maquet, from the novel Le Comte de Monte-Cristo)
• Le Dieu dispose, 1851-52 - God's Will Be Done (tr. 1909)
• Les Drames de la mer, 1852 (2 vols.)
• Histoire de la vie politique et privée de Louis-Philippe, 1852 - The Last King; or, The New France (tr. 1915)
• Mes mémoires, 1852-54 (22 vols.; Memoirs, 2 vols., 1890; 5 vols., 1954-68) - Memoirs (tr. A.F. Davidson, 5 vols., 1891) / My Memoirs (6 vols., tr. E.M. Waller, 1907-09)
• La Comtesse de Charny, 1852-55 - The Countess de Charny (tr. 1853) / La Comtesse de Charny (tr. 1890) / The Countess of Charny (tr. Henry Llewellyn Williams, 1892) - Kreivitär de Charny (suom. Urho Kivimäki, 1924)
• Un Gil Blas en Californie, 1852 - A Gil Blas in California (tr. 1933)
• Conscience l'innocent, 1852 - The Conscript (tr. 1855) / Conscience (tr.  Alfred Allinson, 1902)
• Olympe de Clèves, 1852 - Olympia of Cleves; or, The Loves of a King (tr. 1887) / Olympe de Cleves (tr. 1894) / Madame de Mailly (tr. 1896)
• Emmanuel Philibert, 1852-53 (as Le Page du duc de Savoie, 1855) - Emmanuel Philibert (tr. 1854) / The Page of the Duke of Savoy (tr. 1861)
• Isaac Laquedem, 1852-53
• Le Pasteur d'Ashbourn, 1853
• El Salteador, 1854 - The Brigand (tr. 1897)
• Ingénue, 1854 - Ingenue (tr.  Julie de Marguerittes, 1855)
• Les Mohicans de Paris. Salvator le commissionnaire, 1854-59 (with Paul Bocage) - The Mohicans of Paris (tr. 1859; R.S. Garnett, 1926) / The Horrors of Paris (tr. 1875)
• Catherine Blum, 1854 - The Foresters (tr. 1854) / Catherine Blum (tr. 1861)
• La jeunesse de Louis XIV, 1854 (play) - Young King Louis (tr. 1979)
• Le Marbrier, 1854 (play, with Paul Bocage)
• Romulus, 1854 (play) - Romulus (tr. 1969)
• La Conscience, 1854 (play)
• Une Vie d'artiste, 1854 (2 vols.) - A Life's Ambition (tr. R.S. Garnett, 1924)
• La Jeunesse de Pierrot, 1854 - When Pierrot War Young (tr. Douglas Munro, 1975)
• La Dernière Année de Marie Dorval, 1855
• Isabel Constant, 1855 (2 vols.)
• Le verrou de la reine, 1856 (play)
• L'Orestie, 1856 (play)
• La Tour-Saint-Jacques-la-Boucherie, 1856 (play, with Xavier de Montépin)
• Les Grands Hommes en robe de chambre: Henri IV, Louis XIII, et Richelieu; César, 1856-57 (12 vols.)
• L'Invitation à la valse, 1857 (play) - Childhood's Dreams (tr. 1881)
• Le Meneur de Loups, 1857 - The Wolf-Leader (tr. Alfred Allinson, 1904)
• Les Compagnons de Jéhu, 1857 - Roland of Montreval (tr. 1860) / The Company of Jehu (tr. Katharine Prescott Wormeley, 1894) / Companions of Jehu (tr. 1894) / The Aide-de-Camp of Napoleon (tr. 1897)
• Charles le Téméraire, 1857 - Charles the Bold (tr. 1860)
• L’Homme aux contes, 1857
• Le lièvre de mon grand-père, 1857 (with de Cherville) - The Phantom White Hare and Other Tales (tr. Douglas Munro, 1989)
• La Bacchante (Thais), 1858 (play, with Adolphe de Leuven and A. de Beauplan, music by Eugène Gautier)
• L'honneur est satisfait: comédie en un acte et en prose, 1858 (play)
• Les Forestiers, 1858 (play, from the novel Catherine Blum, in Théâtre complet 13, 1865)
• Black, 1858 - Black (tr. 1895)
• Le capitaine Richard, 1858 - The Twin Captains (tr. 1861) / The Young Captain (tr. 1870) / The Twin Lieutentants (tr. 1877)
• Herminie, 1858
• L'Horoscope, 1858 - The Horoscope (tr. 1897)
• Les Louves de Machecoul, 1859 - The Castle of Souday (tr. Henry L. Williams, Jr., 1862) / Royalist Daughters (tr. Henry L. Williams, Jr., 1862) / The Last Vendee (tr. 1894) / The She Wolves of Machecoul (tr. 1895)
• Ammalet-Beg, 1859 - Sultanetta (in Tales of the Causasus, tr. 1895)
• La boule de neige, 1859 - The Ball of Snow (in Tales of the Caucasus, tr. 1895)
• Le fils du forçat ou Monsieur Coumbes ou Histoire d'un cabanon et d'un chalet, 1859 (as Monsieur Coumbes, 1860; Le Fils de Forçat, 1864) - The Convict's Son (tr. 1905)
• La Princesse Flora, 1859
• Jane, 1859 - Jane (tr. 1903)
• Le Chasseur de sauvigne, 1859 - The Wild Duck Shooter (tr. 1906)
• Le Médecin de Java, 1859 (?, as L'Île de feu, 1870) - Doctor Basilius (tr. 1860)
• Madame de Chamblay, 1859 - Mme. de Chamblay (n.d.)
• Marianna, 1859
• Le Caucase, 1859 - Adventures in Caucasia (tr. A.E. Murch, 1962)
• L'art et les artistes contemporains au Salon de 1859, 1859
• Contes pour les grands et les petits enfants, 1859 (2 vols.)
• Causeries, 1860 (2 vols.)
• La Route de Varennes, 1860 - Flight to Varennes (tr. A. Craig Bell, 1962)
• Mémoires de Garibaldi, 1860 (translator; 2 vols.; rev. ed. 5 vols., 1860-61; 3 vols., 1861) - Garibaldi: An Autobiography (tr. 1860; rev. ed. The Memoirs of Garibaldi, 1931)
• Les Baleiniers, 1860 (3 vols., with Felix Meynard)
• Une aventure d’amour, 1860
• Le Père La Ruine, 1860 (with de Cherville) - Père la Ruine (tr.  Alfred Allinson, 1905)
• La Maison de glace, 1860 - The Russia Gipsy (tr. 1860)
• Jacquot sans oreilles, 1860 - Crop-Ear Jacquot and Other Stories (tr.  Alfred Allinson, 1903)
• Les drames galants: La Marquise d'Escoman, 1860
• La dame de Monsoreau, 1860 (with Auguste Maquet)
• La dame de Monsoreau, 1860 (play, with Auguste Maquet, from the novel)
• L'Envers d'une conspiration, 1860 (play)
• Le Roman d'Elvire, 1860 (play, with Adolphe de Leuven, music by Ambroise Thomas)
• Le gentilhomme de la montagne, 1860 (play, from the novel El Salteador)
• Les Garibaldiens: révolution de Sicile et de Naples , 1861 - The Garibaldians in Sicily (tr. 1861) / On Board the "Emma": Adventures with Garibaldi's "Thousand" in Sicily (ed. R.S. Garnett, 1929)
• Bric-à-brac, 1861 (2 vols.)
• Le Pape devant les Évangiles, 1861
• Le prisonnier de la Bastille: fin des mousquetaires, 1861 (play, with Auguste Maquet, from the novel Le Vicomte de Bragelonne)
• Une nuit à Florence sous Alexandre de Médicis, 1861
• I Borboni di Napoli, 1862-64 (10 vols.)
• Théâtre complet, 1863-1874 (15 vols.)
• Les Mohicans de Paris, 1864 (play, from the novel)
• La pêche aux filets, 1864
• La Sanfelice, 1864-65 - Love and Liberty (tr. 1869) / The Lovely Lady Hamilton (tr. 1903) / Nelson at Naples  (tr.  R.S. Garnett, 1917) / The Neapolitan Lovers (tr.  R.S. Garnett, 1917)
• Souvenirs d'une favorite, 1865
• Impressions de voyage en Russie, 1865 (4 vols., as Voyage en Russie, 1960) - Adventures in Czarist Russia (tr. 1960)
• Bouts-Rimés, 1865
• Le comte de Moret ou Le sphinx rouge, 1866 - The Count of Moret (tr. Henry L. Williams, Jr., 1868) - Punainen kardinaali (suom. Ruth Pakaslahti, 1948; Olli Nuorto, 1948)
• Gabriel Lambert, 1866 (play, with Amédee de Jallais, from the novel; as Gabriel le Faussaire, prod. 1868)
• Les Blancs et les Bleus, 1867 - The Polish Spy (tr. 1869) / The First Republic (tr. 1894) / The Whites and the Blues (tr. Frank J. Morlock, 1894)
• Étude sur "Hamlet" et sur William Shakespeare, 1867
• La Terreur prussienne, 1867 - The Prussian Terror (tr. R.S. Garnett, 1915)
• Les Hommes de fer, 1867
• Le Huitième Croisade, 1868 - The Eighth Crusade (tr. 1890)
• Parisiens et Provinciaux, 1868 (with de Cherville) - Parisians and Provincials (translated and edited by A. Craig Bell, 1995)
• Histoire de mes bêtes, 1868 - My Pets (tr. Alfred Allinson, 1909) / Adventures with My Pets (tr. 1960)
• Madame de Chamblay, 1868 (play, from the novel)
• Souvenirs dramatiques, 1868 (2 vols.)
• Le chevalier de Sainte-Hermine, 1869 - The Last Cavalier: Being the Adventures of Count Sainte-Hermine in the Age of Napoleon (tr. Lauren Yoder)
• Les Blancs et les Bleus, 1869 (play, from the novel)
• Création and Redemption: Le Docteur Mysterieux, La fille du Marquis , 1872
• Théâtre complet, 1873-1876 (25 vols.)
• Le grand dictionnaire de cuisine, 1873 - Dictionary of Cuisine (tr. 1958) / Dumas on Food (tr.  Alan and Jane Davidson, 1978)
• Propos d'art et de cuisine, 1877
• Œuvres complètes, 1885-88 (301 vols.)
• The Novels, 1903-11 (56 vols., tr. Alfred Allinson)
• The Dumas Fairy Tale Book, 1924 (ed. H.A. Spurr)
• Antony, 1931 (in Nineteenth Century French Plays, ed. J.L. Borgerhoff; French Romantic Plays, ed. W.W. Comfort, 1933)
• Henry III and His Court, 1931 (in Nineteenth Century French Plays, ed. J.L. Borgerhoff; Chief French Plays of the Nineteenth Century, ed.  E.M. Grant, 1934)
• Ivanhoë, La chasse et l'amour, La noce et l'enterrement, Fiesque de Lavagna, Henri III et sa cour, 1974 (plays)
• Le Chevalier de Sainte-Hermine, 2005 (ed. Claude Schopp)