Pierre Benoit (novelist)

Pierre Benoit in 1932

Pierre Benoit (16 July 1886 – 3 March 1962) was a French novelist and member of the Académie française.[1]

Pierre Benoit, born in Albi (southern France) was the son of a French soldier. Benoit spent his early years and military service in Northern Africa, before becoming a civil servant.[2] His first novel, Koenigsmark, was published in 1918; L'Atlantide was published the next year and was awarded the Grand Prize of the Académie française.[2] Benoit became a member of the Académie in 1931.[2]

A political right-winger, Benoit was an admirer of the French fascist Charles Maurras.[2] During the Nazi Occupation of France, Benoît joined the "Groupe Collaboration", a pro-Nazi arts group whose other members included Abel Bonnard, Georges Claude and Pierre Drieu La Rochelle.[3] This led him to be arrested in September 1944; he was eventually released after six months, but his work remained on the "blacklist" of French Nazi collaborators for several years afterwards.[2]

Late in his life, Benoit gave a series of interviews with the French writer Paul Guimard.[2]

He died in March 1962 in Ciboure.

Bibliography

References

  1. French Twentieth Bibliography: Critical and Bibliographical William J. Thompson - 2001... - Page 17210 "Maltère, Stéphane: "Le monde littéraire antique dans L'Atlantide de Pierre Benoit, " Cahiers des Amis de Pierre Benoit, no. 10 (1999), 21-30. [BNF] X1361. Monestier, Louis: "Histoire de l'association des 'Amis de Pierre Benoit'. Première partie ..."
  2. 1 2 3 4 5 6 Hugo Frey, "Afterword" to The Queen of Atlantis, Bison Books, ISBN 0803269161, (p.289-312)
  3. Karen Fiss, Grand Illusion: The Third Reich, the Paris Exposition, and the Cultural Seduction of France. University of Chicago Press, 2009 ISBN 0226252019, (p.201)

External links


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