Franz Hessel was a German writer and translator.

With Walter Benjamin

Walter Benjamin

Walter Bendix Schönflies Benjamin was a German-Jewish intellectual, who functioned variously as a literary critic, philosopher, sociologist, translator, radio broadcaster and essayist...

, he produced a German translation of Marcel Proust

Marcel Proust

Valentin Louis Georges Eugène Marcel Proust was a French novelist, critic, and essayist best known for his monumental À la recherche du temps perdu...

's À la recherche du temps perdu.

Hessel was one of the first German exponents of the French idea of flânerie

Flâneur

The term flâneur comes from the French masculine noun flâneur—which has the basic meanings of "stroller", "lounger", "saunterer", "loafer"—which itself comes from the French verb flâner, which means "to stroll". Charles Baudelaire developed a derived meaning of flâneur—that of "a person who walks...

, and later published a collection of essays on the subject related to his native Berlin, "Spazieren in Berlin".
He was the father of diplomat Stéphane Hessel

Stéphane Hessel

Stéphane Frédéric Hessel is a diplomat, ambassador, writer, concentration camp survivor, former French Resistance fighter and BCRA agent. Born German, he became a naturalised French citizen in 1939...

.

Hessel was the inspiration for the character of Jules in Henri-Pierre Roche

Henri-Pierre Roché

Henri-Pierre Roché was a French author who was deeply involved with the artistic avant-garde in Paris and the Dada movement.- Biography :Roché was born in Paris, France. In 1898, he was an art student at the Académie Julian....

's novel Jules et Jim.