François Mauriac

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François Mauriac

François Mauriac (born October 11, 1885 in Bordeaux , † September 1, 1970 in Paris ) was a French writer.

Mauriac, who was the eighth French author to be awarded the Nobel Prize in 1952, is considered one of the most important novelists of the period between the world wars and an important representative of the ' renouveau catholique ', a left-wing Catholic movement that emerged around 1890, that is, based on Catholic social teaching .

Life and work

Youth and literary beginnings

Mauriac grew up as the fifth and youngest child of a well-off family in Bordeaux and was influenced by his pious mother after the early death of his father. He spent his school days in Catholic private schools. The first author he admired as a role model was the Catholic-Conservative-Patriotic novelist Maurice Barrès . At the age of 18, however, he was confronted with the social problems of his time and developed a religiosity that was reserved towards the official church .

After studying literature in Bordeaux, from which he graduated with a license , he was admitted to the traditional Paris École des Chartes for postgraduate studies as archivist in 1908 . But he broke off this and devoted himself to literature and literary journalism.

He made his debut with pathetic and pious poems, the collective edition of which Les mains jointes (The folded hands, 1909) achieved a respectable success. In 1911 the poetry collection Adieu à l'adolescence (Farewell to the Young) followed. He then changed genre and published his first novel in 1913, L'Enfant chargé de chaînes (The child laden with chains), which was followed by the next one in 1914, La Robe prétexte (The pretext / feed robe).

In 1913 he married (and became a father three times and later a fourth time in quick succession). 1914-17 he took part in the First World War as a paramedic until he contracted a febrile illness (malaria?) While working in the Balkans and was retired.

The time of success

Back in Paris, he published a number of novels that established his fame and brought him into the Académie française in 1933 .

The best-known of these novels were (all titles here are literally translated as above and do not always correspond to those of the German editions listed below): La Chair et le Sang (Das Fleisch und das Blut, 1920), Préséances (Fee- bearing precedence, 1921), Le Baiser au lépreux (Kissing the Leper, 1922), Génitrix (1923), Le Désert de l'amour (The Desert of Love, 1925), Thérèse Desqueyroux (1927), Nœud de vipères ( Adder knot , 1932), Le Mystère Frontenac (The Secret Frontenac, 1933).

The acts usually take place in a milieu of well-heeled landowners and businessmen in the south-west French province, which is well known to the author. H. a social category that stagnated economically after the World War or even drew on its substance and lived accordingly fixated on itself. A central issue are marital crises that result from the fact that not only women but also men experience sexuality as impure and annoying. Another issue is the up to the psychological terror continuous pressure to conform in the narrow circle of the semblance of respectability herding families.

In 1932 Mauriac had to undergo surgery for a cancer of the larynx, which earned him the hoarse voice that became one of his trademarks as a radio commentator.

In 1937 he tried his hand at playing successfully as a playwright with Asmodée , but was able to do so with his other plays Les mal aimées (The Unloved, 1945), Le Passage du Malin (The Devil's Visit, 1947) and Le Feu sur la terre (Fire on Earth , 1950) did not repeat the success. His main genre remained the novel, although he wrote about 10 more after the ones listed above, which however no longer found a great response in the politically and socially rapidly changing France of the late 30s and 40s.

The publicist

If Mauriac was able to maintain his position as a well-known and respected intellectual , it was mainly because he increasingly used the prestige he had gained as a novelist in journalism and as a left-wing Catholic anti - fascist was involved with political articles. In the mid-30s he took z. B. Position against Mussolini's campaign in Ethiopia and General Franco's coup , which should cause him difficulties after Marshal Pétain came to power in 1940. Consequently, he joined the anti-pétainist and anti-German resistance movement, which he supported journalistically under the pseudonym "Forez".

After the liberation from the German occupation he was made an officer of the Legion of Honor , but soon distanced himself from the new rulers and acted as a Christian-humanitarian fighter against injustice of all kinds. collabos ”(former collaborators with the German occupiers) and denounced the cruel repression and wars with which France tried to keep its colonial territories in Southeast Asia and Africa after 1945.

It was certainly also in recognition of his journalistic oeuvre that he was awarded the Nobel Prize in 1952.

During the Algerian War (1954-62), Mauriac campaigned for the independence of Algeria in his critical columns ( bloc-notes ) in Figaro and Express and condemned the use of torture by the French army.

In his later years he wrote multi-volume memoirs and a biography of Charles de Gaulle .

Nobel Prize in Literature 1952

He was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature for his novels because, according to the Nobel Prize Committee, they opened up 'profound spiritual insights' and 'their artistic passion' permeates 'the drama of human existence'.

Since 1946 his name has been on the list of possible Nobel Prize candidates. His ten or so novels and essays had already been translated into Swedish by then, so the reporters did not have to introduce any strangers. Some major works such as Le désert de l'amour (1925) (D 1927: Die Einöde der Liebe), Génitrix (1923) (D 1928: The death of the young woman), Thérèse Desqueyroux (1927) (D 1928: The deed of Therese Desqueyroux), Le Nœud de Vipères (1932) (D 1936: The Snake Breed ) and La Pharisienne (1941) (D 1946: The Pharisee) are described as the high points of Mauriac's novels.

His works are anchored in a clearly defined landscape and an unmistakable climate: his homeland, Bordeaux, forms the milieu and the atmosphere of the author's novels and "his Christian piety [is] mixed with the pepper of the devil". "His serious and penetrating, but never actually negative, analysis of the human soul has contributed something essential to literature."

" Everyone knows that they could be less bad than they naturally are, " that is the key to Mauriac's work. “It is more than the fruit of a mania driven to virtuosity when the writer plunges himself into the weaknesses and vices of people. Even where he ruthlessly dissects reality, Mauriac retains the ultimate certainty of a mercy that transcends understanding. "

He was distinguished as a man of letters of the French spirit, but also as deeply rooted in the Christian faith, as the press noted as “the Catholic moralist”.

In 1958 he was elected as an honorary foreign member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters .

Works (selection)

Autobiography
Letters
  • Georges-Paul Collet (eds.): Correspondance entre François Mauriac and Jacques-Émile Blanche . 1916-1942 . Grasset, Paris 1976
  • John E. Flowers (Ed.): Correspondance 1925-1967. François Mauriac and Jean Paulhan . Self-published, Paris 2001 ISBN 2-912222-15-X
prose
  • The leper and the saint. Novel. (Le baiser au lépreux) Insel-Bücherei 215/2, Leipzig 1928. Translated by Yvan Goll
  • The wasteland of love. Novel. (Le désert de l'amour) Insel, Wiesbaden 1953. Translated by Georg Cramer
  • The deed of Thérèse Desqueyroux . Novel. (Thérèse Desqueyroux) Insel, Leipzig 1928; again Insel-Bücherei 766, Frankfurt 1985 ISBN 3-518-01636-9 Übers. Marie Dessauer
  • Adder breeding. Novel. (Nœud de vipères) 2nd edition, Berlin 1980. Translated by Franz Schmal
  • Flesh and blood. Novel. (La chair et le sang) Rowohlt, Hamburg 1955. Translated by Carl A. Weber
  • Genitrix. Novel. (Génitrix) Wehrhahn, Laatzen 2000 ISBN 3-932324-08-0 Translated by Jutta Muschard
  • The end of the night. Novel. (La fin de la nuit) List, Munich 1956. Translated by Fritz Montfort
  • The Frontenac secret . (Le mystère Frontenac) Rowohlt, Reinbek 1989 ISBN 3-499-12522-6 Translated by Lilly von Sauter
  • The bread of life. (Le pain vivant) Kerle, Heidelberg 1955. Transl. Leopold Voelker
  • Because you can cry. (Le sagouin) Goldmann, Munich 1956. Translated by Elisabeth Serelman-Küchler
  • The Pharisee. Novel. (La Pharisienne) Ullstein, Frankfurt 1958. Translated by Rudolf Caltofen
  • The young man Alain. Novel. (Un adolescent d'autrefois) Ullstein, Frankfurt 1971 ISBN 3-548-02850-0 Transl. Wolfgang Teuschl
  • The ways of the sea. Novel. (Le chemins de la mer) E. Kaiser, Klagenfurt 1973. Translated by Udo Wolf
Non-fiction

Film adaptations

  • 1955: Bread of Life (Le pain vivant) - Director: Jean Mousselle (based on the novel of the same name)
  • 1962: The act of Thérèse D. (Thérèse Desqueyroux) - Director: Georges Franju (based loosely on the novel of the same name)
  • 1972: Le sagouin - directed by Serge Moati (based on the novel of the same name).
  • 1973: Génitrix - directed by Paul Paviot (based on the novel of the same name)
  • 1975: Le mystère Froneac - Director: Maurice Frydland (based on the novel of the same name)
  • 1979: Le baiser au lépreux - Director: André Michel (based on the novel of the same name)
  • 1980: La pharisienne - Directed by Gilbert Pineau (based on the novel of the same name)
  • 1980: Le nœud de vipères - Director: Jacques Trébouta (based on the novel of the same name)
  • 1983: Un adolescent d'autrefois - Director: André Michel (based on the novel of the same name)
  • 2012: Thérèse (Thérèse Desqueyroux) - Director: Claude Miller (based on the novel of the same name)

literature

  • Gilbert Balavoine: François Mauriac. Un journalist engaged . Édition Confluences, Bordeaux 2007, ISBN 978-2-35527-000-0 .
  • Jean-Luc Barré: François Mauriac. Biography intimate . Fayard, Paris 2009/10
  1. 1885-1940 . 2009, ISBN 978-2-213-62636-9 .
  2. 1940-1970 . 2010, ISBN 978-2-213-65577-2 .

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Official site of the Nobel Prize Committee In English it says that the prize was awarded to Mauriuac "... for the deep spiritual insight and the artistic intensity with which he has penetrated the drama of human life in his novels"
  2. ^ Honorary Members: François Mauriac. American Academy of Arts and Letters, accessed March 15, 2019 .

Web links

Commons : François Mauriac  - Collection of images, videos and audio files
personal data
SURNAME Mauriac, François
BRIEF DESCRIPTION French author
DATE OF BIRTH October 11, 1885
PLACE OF BIRTH Bordeaux
DATE OF DEATH September 1, 1970
Place of death Paris