Victor Séjour was one of the few black writers from antebellum New Orleans to lead a distinguished literary career. Twenty of his plays were published in Paris, and still more were produced on the stage in Paris and New Orleans.

According to baptismal records, Victor Séjour was born Juan Victor Séjour Marcou et Ferrand on 2 June 1817 in New Orleans to Juan François Louis Séjour Marcou, a free mulatto from Santo Domingo who operated a cleaning establishment on Chartres Street in the old quarter, and d'Eloisa Phillippe Ferrand, a free octoroon of the city. The free black population of this European city on the North American continent held education in high esteem, and Séjour attended Saint-Barbe Academy, where he proved himself a gifted and determined student and came under the influence of Michel Séligny, a...