André Maurois
Encyclopedia
Life
Maurois was born in ElbeufElbeuf
-Population:-Places of interest:* The mairie, also housing the museum.* Two seventeenth century churches.* Some sixteenth century houses.* A fifteenth century stone cross.* The theatre , renovated in the late twentieth century.-Notable people:...
and educated at the Lycée Pierre Corneille
Lycée Pierre Corneille (Rouen)
The Lycée Pierre-Corneille is a school in Rouen, France. It was founded by the Archbishop of Rouen, Charles, Cardinal de Bourbon and run by the Jesuits to educate the children of the aristocracy and bourgeoisie in accordance with the purest doctrinal principles of Roman Catholicism...
in Rouen
Rouen
Rouen , in northern France on the River Seine, is the capital of the Haute-Normandie region and the historic capital city of Normandy. Once one of the largest and most prosperous cities of medieval Europe , it was the seat of the Exchequer of Normandy in the Middle Ages...
, both in Normandy
Normandy
Normandy is a geographical region corresponding to the former Duchy of Normandy. It is in France.The continental territory covers 30,627 km² and forms the preponderant part of Normandy and roughly 5% of the territory of France. It is divided for administrative purposes into two régions:...
. Maurois was the son of Ernest Herzog, a Jewish textile manufacturer, and Alice (Lévy-Rueff) Herzog. His family had fled Alsace
Alsace
Alsace is the fifth-smallest of the 27 regions of France in land area , and the smallest in metropolitan France. It is also the seventh-most densely populated region in France and third most densely populated region in metropolitan France, with ca. 220 inhabitants per km²...
after the Franco-Prussian War
Franco-Prussian War
The Franco-Prussian War or Franco-German War, often referred to in France as the 1870 War was a conflict between the Second French Empire and the Kingdom of Prussia. Prussia was aided by the North German Confederation, of which it was a member, and the South German states of Baden, Württemberg and...
of 1870–1871 and took refuge in Normandy, where they owned a woolen mill at Elbeuf.
During World War I he joined the French army
French Army
The French Army, officially the Armée de Terre , is the land-based and largest component of the French Armed Forces.As of 2010, the army employs 123,100 regulars, 18,350 part-time reservists and 7,700 Legionnaires. All soldiers are professionals, following the suspension of conscription, voted in...
and served as an interpreter and later a liaison officer to the British army
British Army
The British Army is the land warfare branch of Her Majesty's Armed Forces in the United Kingdom. It came into being with the unification of the Kingdom of England and Scotland into the Kingdom of Great Britain in 1707. The new British Army incorporated Regiments that had already existed in England...
. His first novel, Les silences du colonel Bramble, was a witty but socially realistic account of that experience. It was an immediate success in France. It was translated and also became popular in the United Kingdom and other English-speaking countries as The Silence of Colonel Bramble. Many of his other works have also been translated into English (mainly by Hamish Miles (1894–1937)), as they often dealt with British people or topics, such as his biographies of Disraeli, Byron, and Shelley
Percy Bysshe Shelley
Percy Bysshe Shelley was one of the major English Romantic poets and is critically regarded as among the finest lyric poets in the English language. Shelley was famous for his association with John Keats and Lord Byron...
.
In 1938 Maurois was elected to the prestigious Académie française
Académie française
L'Académie française , also called the French Academy, is the pre-eminent French learned body on matters pertaining to the French language. The Académie was officially established in 1635 by Cardinal Richelieu, the chief minister to King Louis XIII. Suppressed in 1793 during the French Revolution,...
. Maurois was encouraged and assisted in seeking this post by Marshal Philippe Pétain
Philippe Pétain
Henri Philippe Benoni Omer Joseph Pétain , generally known as Philippe Pétain or Marshal Pétain , was a French general who reached the distinction of Marshal of France, and was later Chief of State of Vichy France , from 1940 to 1944...
, and he made a point of acknowledging with thanks his debt to Pétain in his 1941 autobiography, "Call no man happy" – though by the time of writing, their paths had sharply diverged, Pétain having become Head of State of the Nazi-collaborationist Vichy France
Vichy France
Vichy France, Vichy Regime, or Vichy Government, are common terms used to describe the government of France that collaborated with the Axis powers from July 1940 to August 1944. This government succeeded the Third Republic and preceded the Provisional Government of the French Republic...
.
When World War II began, he was appointed the French Official Observer attached to the British General Headquarters. In his official capacity he accompanied the British Army to Belgium. He personally knew the main politicians of the French Government, and on 10 June 1940, he was sent on a mission to London. The Armistice ended that mission. Maurois was demobilized and traveled from England to Canada. He wrote of these experiences in his book, Tragedy in France.
During World War II he served in the French army and the Free French Forces
Free French Forces
The Free French Forces were French partisans in World War II who decided to continue fighting against the forces of the Axis powers after the surrender of France and subsequent German occupation and, in the case of Vichy France, collaboration with the Germans.-Definition:In many sources, Free...
.
"André Maurois" was a pseudonym
Pen name
A pen name, nom de plume, or literary double, is a pseudonym adopted by an author. A pen name may be used to make the author's name more distinctive, to disguise his or her gender, to distance an author from some or all of his or her works, to protect the author from retribution for his or her...
that became his legal name in 1947.
He died in 1967 after a long career as an author of novels, biographies, histories, children's books and science fiction
Science fiction
Science fiction is a genre of fiction dealing with imaginary but more or less plausible content such as future settings, futuristic science and technology, space travel, aliens, and paranormal abilities...
stories. He is buried in the Neuilly-sur-Seine community cemetery
Neuilly-sur-Seine community cemetery
The Neuilly-sur-Seine community cemetery in the Hauts-de-Seine département of France is in the western suburbs of Paris, near La Défense.-Notable interments:*René Clair , film director*Pierre Drieu La Rochelle , writer...
near Paris.
Family
Maurois's first wife was Jeanne-Marie Wanda de Szymkiewicz, a RussianRussians
The Russian people are an East Slavic ethnic group native to Russia, speaking the Russian language and primarily living in Russia and neighboring countries....
girl who had studied at Oxford University. She had a nervous breakdown in 1918 and in 1924 she died of septicemia. After the death of his father, Maurois gave up the family business of textile manufacturing.
Maurois's second wife was Simone de Caillevet, the granddaughter of Anatole France
Anatole France
Anatole France , born François-Anatole Thibault, , was a French poet, journalist, and novelist. He was born in Paris, and died in Saint-Cyr-sur-Loire. He was a successful novelist, with several best-sellers. Ironic and skeptical, he was considered in his day the ideal French man of letters...
's mistress Léontine Arman de Caillavet
Léontine Lippmann
Léontine Lippmann , better known by her married name of Madame Arman or Madame Arman de Caillavet was the muse of Anatole France and the hostess of a highly fashionable literary salon during the French Third Republic...
. After Germany occupied France, the couple moved to the United States to help with propaganda work against the Nazis.
Quotations
- "We appreciate frankness from those who like us. Frankness from others is called insolence."
- "In literature as in love, we are astonished at what is chosen by others."
- "The minds of different generations are as impenetrable one by the other as are the monads of Leibniz." (from Ariel, 1923).
- "Who in Europe, or America, for that matter, knows that Kansas City is one of the loveliest cities on earth? And yet it is true."
- "Without a family, man, alone in the world, trembles with the cold."