Fred Vargas

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Fred Vargas, 2009

Fred Vargas [ fʀɛd vaʀ'ɡaz ] is the stage name of the French writer, historian , medieval archaeologist and archaeozoologist Frédérique Audoin-Rouzeau (born June 7, 1957 in Paris ). The French Commissioner Jean-Baptiste Adamsberg is at the center of many of her crime novels .

The pseudonym originated from the abbreviation of her first name and the surname of the film character "Maria Vargas" ( Ava Gardner in the film " The Barefoot Countess ").

Life

Fred Vargas is the daughter of the cultural journalist Philippe Audoin , a member of the Surrealists , and a sister of the historian Stéphane Audoin-Rouzeau . Her twin sister, the painter Joëlle Audoin-Rouzeau, used the fictional surname before her under the pseudonym Jo Vargas .

Fred Vargas lives with her son in the Paris district of Montparnasse and works as an archaeologist (specializing in archaeozoology with a focus on the Middle Ages) at CNRS . Since 1986 she has been writing detective novels during her vacation time, later distancing herself from her first work Les Jeux de l'amour et de la mort after she had found her own style with her second novel, L'homme aux cercles bleus , in 1991.

In 2004 she turned to a (cultural) political issue with her advocacy for the former terrorist and today's writer Cesare Battisti . The background to this is the threatened extradition of numerous ex-political offenders and current cultural workers to Italy after they had been tolerated in France for many years due to a decree by François Mitterrand .

In 2019 she published with L'Humanité en péril. Virons de bord, toute! an essay on climate change that received a lot of attention in France. Fred Vargas introduced him on May 1st on the French literary show La Grande Librairie ; The title was one of the best-selling non-fiction books in France in May 2019.

Main characters of her novels

Her characters are typically bizarre and amiable. Two series of novels about a group of investigators each can be distinguished - but these are known to each other. The plot of the novels has something grotesque about it, whereby references to surrealism (part of the author's family background) cannot be overlooked, but it always remains logical.

Adamsberg, Danglard and Camille

  • Jean-Baptiste Adamsberg : Commissioner in the 13th arrondissement in Paris, who solves his cases through intuition with obvious external slowness, on the other hand does not understand how others can come to a result through reflection
  • Adrien Danglard: his inspector, the systematic and intellectual counterpart to Adamsberg, who feeds five children as a single parent, is inclined to white wine and often cannot follow the thoughts of his superior
  • Camille Forestier: Adamsberg's former and recurring lover, who works alternately as a musician and plumber and prefers to read tool catalogs, like Markari's superintendent Charito's dictionaries
  • With Camille, Adamsberg has a young son, Tom, whom he sporadically looks after.

Kehlweiler and the Evangelists

  • Ludwig (Louis) Kehlweiler: son of a French woman and a German Wehrmacht officer, former employee of the Interior Ministry, who has an extensive network of informants and an extensive criminal archive, and always carries the toad Bufo with him; whose assistants are:
  • Mathias Delamarre, known as Saint Matthew : prehistoric, lives on the first floor
  • Marc Vandoosler, known as Saint Markus : runs the household during the day, works as a medievalist at night , lives on the second floor
  • Lucien Devernois, known as Saint Luke : historian specializing in the First World War (like the author's brother), lives on the third floor
    • These three people, the evangelists , live in the barrack , a four-story house, together with
  • Armand Vandoosler, known as Vandoosler the Elder , a former police officer and uncle of Marc, who lives on the fourth floor
  • The ground floor serves as the refectory for the four residents who call themselves with a knock under the ceiling with the help of a broomstick. 1 × for Mathias, 2 × for Marc, 3 × for Lucien, 4 × for old Vandoosler, 7 × for everyone.

(see Fred Vargas The beautiful diva of Saint-Jaques )

Awards

Works sorted by main characters

Adamsberg

  • L'homme aux cercles bleus , 1991, German: Another train is leaving the Gare du Nord. Kriminalroman , Aufbau-Verlag, Berlin 2003, ISBN 3-7466-1516-X .
  • L'homme à l'envers , 1999, German: At nightfall. Detective novel , Aufbau-Verlag, Berlin 2005, ISBN 3-7466-2158-5 .
  • Les quatre fleuves , with illustrations by Edmond Baudoin , 2000, Novel-Comic, ISBN 2-87858-134-2 . German: The sign of Aries , Aufbau-Verlag 2008, ISBN 978-3-351-03250-0 .
  • Pars vite et reviens tard , 2001, German: Flee far and fast. Novel . Aufbau-Verlag, Berlin 2004, ISBN 3-7466-2115-1 .
  • Coule la Seine . Nouvelles policières: Salut et liberté. La nuit des brutes. Cinq francs pièce . 2002, ISBN 2-87858-166-0 (in Reclam-Verlag Fremdsprachentexte, ISBN 3-15-009136-5 ), German: The black waters of the Seine , crime stories: Salut et liberté, The night of the barbarians, five francs the piece , Aufbau-Verlag Berlin 2007, ISBN 978-3-7466-2350-4
  • Sous les vents de Neptune , 2004, German: The fourteenth stone. Roman , Aufbau-Verlag, Berlin 2005, ISBN 3-351-03030-4 .
  • Dans les bois éternels , 2006, ISBN 2-87858-233-0 , German: Die third Jungfrau , Aufbau-Verlag, Berlin 2007, ISBN 978-3-351-03205-0 .
  • Un Lieu Incertain , 2008, German: Der Verbotene Ort , Aufbau-Verlag, Berlin 2009, ISBN 978-3-351-03256-2 .
  • Le marchand d`éponges , 2010, German: Die Tote im Pelzmantel , Aufbau-Verlag, Berlin 2011, ISBN 978-3-351-03351-4 . (Graphic Novel, with Edmond Baudoin)
  • L'armée furieuse , 2011, German: Die Nacht des Zorns , Aufbau-Verlag, Berlin 2012, ISBN 978-3-351-03380-4 .
  • Temps glaciaires , 2015, German: Das barmherzige Fallbeil , Limes Verlag, 2015, ISBN 978-3-8090-2659-4 .
  • Quand sort la recluse , 2017, German: Der Zorn der Einsiedlerin , Limes Verlag, 2018, ISBN 978-3-8090-2693-8 .

The three evangelists

  • Debout les morts , 1995, German: The beautiful diva of Saint-Jacques. Detective novel , Aufbau-Verlag, Berlin 2000, ISBN 3-7466-1519-4 .
  • Un peu plus loin sur la droite , 1996, German: The Oracle of Port Nicolas. Kriminalroman , Aufbau-Verlag, Berlin 2003, ISBN 3-7466-1514-3 .
  • Sans feu ni lieu , 1997, German: The inconsolable widower of Montparnasse. Kriminalroman , Aufbau-Verlag, Berlin 2004, ISBN 3-7466-1511-9 . (Is incorrectly referred to in the book as the second thriller of the three young academics, probably because it was translated before the “oracle”: the German copyright dates to 1999, that of the “oracle” to 2001.)

Others

  • Les jeux de l'amour et de la mort , 1986, ISBN 2-7024-7856-5 .
  • Ceux qui vont mourir te saluent , 1994, German: In the shadow of the Palazzo Farnese. Kriminalroman , Aufbau-Verlag, Berlin 2003, ISBN 3-7466-1515-1 .
  • Le Marchand d'éponges , with illustrations by Edmond Baudoin , Librio n ° 980, 2010, ISBN 978-2-290-02718-9 . German: Die Tote im Pelzmantel , Aufbau-Verlag 2011, ISBN 978-3-351-03351-4 .
  • Petit traité de toutes vérités sur l'existence , essay, 2001, German: On the meaning of life, love and tidying up cupboards , Aufbau-Verlag, Berlin 2005, ISBN 3-351-02602-1 .
  • Critique de l'anxiété pure , essay, 2003, German: About love, left hands and the fear of empty shopping baskets , Aufbau-Verlag, Berlin 2015, ISBN 978-3-7466-3112-7 .
  • La vérité sur Cesare Battisti . Viviane Harny, Paris 2004, ISBN 2-87858-195-4 .
  • L'Humanité en péril. Virons de bord, toute! Essay. Flammarion, Paris 2019, ISBN 978-2-08-149086-4 .

Film adaptations

  • Pars vite et reviens tard ("Flee far and fast") was filmed in 2007 under the direction of Régis Wargnier and releasedon DVD in Germanyunder the title Saat des Todes . The English title is Seeds of Death .
  • Between 2008 and 2010, Josée Dayan directed several crime film adaptations for television ( Sous les vents de Neptune , L'homme à l'envers , L'homme aux cercles bleus and Un lieu incertain ), in each of which Jean-Hugues Anglade took on the role of Fred Vargas' serial hero Jean-Baptiste Adamsberg.

Audiobooks (excerpt)

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Top 20: le grand chamboulement. Retrieved May 19, 2019 (French).
personal data
SURNAME Vargas, Fred
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Audoin-Rouzeau, Frédérique (real name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION French crime novelist and archaeologist
DATE OF BIRTH June 7, 1957
PLACE OF BIRTH Paris , France