Pierre Guyotat
Encyclopedia
Pierre Guyotat is a French
writer. He was born on January 9, 1940 at Bourg-Argental
, Loire
.
in the same year. In 1962 he was found guilty of desertion and publishing forbidden material. After three months in jail he was transferred to a disciplinary centre. Back in Paris, he got involved in journalism, writing first for France Observateur, then for Nouvel Observateur. In 1964, Guyotat published his second novel Ashby.
In 1965, he publishedTombeau pour cinq cent mille soldats (later released in English as Tomb for 500,000 Soldiers). Based on Guyotot's ordeal as a soldier in the Algerian War, the book earned a cult reputation and became the subject of various controversies, mostly because of its omnipresent sexual obsessions and homoeroticism.
In 1968, Guyotat became a member of the French Communist Party, which he left in 1971.
Eden, Eden, Eden came out in 1971 with a preface by Michel Leiris
, Roland Barthes
and Philippe Sollers
(Michel Foucault's text was received late and therefore didn't appear as a preface). This book was banned from being publicized or sold to under-18s. A petition of international support was signed (notably by Pier Paolo Pasolini
, Jean-Paul Sartre
, Pierre Boulez
, Joseph Beuys
, Pierre Dac
, Jean Genet
, Joseph Kessel
, Maurice Blanchot
, Max Ernst
, Italo Calvino
, Jacques Monod
, Simone de Beauvoir
, and Nathalie Sarraute
). François Mitterrand
, and Georges Pompidou
tried to get the ban lifted but failed. Claude Simon
(who won the Nobel Prize in 1985) resigned from the jury of the Prix Médicis
after the prize wasn't awarded to Eden, Eden, Eden.
In 1973, Guyotat's play Bond en avant ("Leap Forward") was performed. During the 70s Guyotat was involved in various diverse protests: for soldiers, immigrants, and prostitutes. One of those cases was of great importance for him: he personally helped Mohamed Laïd Moussa, an 24 years old Algerian ex-teacher who was accused and then found guilty of unintended murder in Marseille. One week after he came out of jail, Mohamed Laïd Moussa was murdered by a masked man; the event had a profound impact on Pierre Guyotat, who carried on the battle for a while.
In 1975 his novel Prostitution
came out (which incorporated Bond en avant as the final monologue). For now on, Guyotat's novels deal with a new kind of illegibility and obscenity. The fictions still explore the unthinkable possibility of worlds structured by sexual slavery and transgression of fundamental taboos. But French language is now unrecognizable, estranged by an extreme grammatical, syntactic and lexical creativity. Ellipses of letters or words, neologisms and phonetic transcriptions of Arabic speaking utterances make it difficult to understand. In the 1987 reedition of Prostitution, a 120 pages appendix - resume, glossary, "grammar" and translations - is added to the actual fiction and help the disoriented reader.
In 1977, while working on Le Livre (1984) and Histoire de Samora Machel (yet unpublished), he suffered a psychiatric illness. The depression and the deterioration of his physical and mental state culminated, in December 1981, in a coma.
On December 30, 1981, the ban on Eden, Eden, Eden was lifted.
From 1984 to 1986, Guyotat gave a series of readings and performances of his work all over Europe.
In January 2000 he was involved in the reopening of the Centre Georges Pompidou
at Beaubourg, contributing a reading of the first pages of Progénitures. In 2005, Sur un cheval was reedited and in April 2005 it was read on Radio France under Alain Ollivier's direction.
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
writer. He was born on January 9, 1940 at Bourg-Argental
Bourg-Argental
Bourg-Argental is a commune in the Loire department in central France....
, Loire
Loire
Loire is an administrative department in the east-central part of France occupying the River Loire's upper reaches.-History:Loire was created in 1793 when after just 3½ years the young Rhône-et-Loire department was split into two. This was a response to counter-Revolutionary activities in Lyon...
.
Biography
In 1960, Guyotat wrote his first novel, Sur un cheval. He was called to AlgeriaAlgeria
Algeria , officially the People's Democratic Republic of Algeria , also formally referred to as the Democratic and Popular Republic of Algeria, is a country in the Maghreb region of Northwest Africa with Algiers as its capital.In terms of land area, it is the largest country in Africa and the Arab...
in the same year. In 1962 he was found guilty of desertion and publishing forbidden material. After three months in jail he was transferred to a disciplinary centre. Back in Paris, he got involved in journalism, writing first for France Observateur, then for Nouvel Observateur. In 1964, Guyotat published his second novel Ashby.
In 1965, he publishedTombeau pour cinq cent mille soldats (later released in English as Tomb for 500,000 Soldiers). Based on Guyotot's ordeal as a soldier in the Algerian War, the book earned a cult reputation and became the subject of various controversies, mostly because of its omnipresent sexual obsessions and homoeroticism.
In 1968, Guyotat became a member of the French Communist Party, which he left in 1971.
Eden, Eden, Eden came out in 1971 with a preface by Michel Leiris
Michel Leiris
Julien Michel Leiris was a French surrealist writer and ethnographer.-Biography:...
, Roland Barthes
Roland Barthes
Roland Gérard Barthes was a French literary theorist, philosopher, critic, and semiotician. Barthes' ideas explored a diverse range of fields and he influenced the development of schools of theory including structuralism, semiotics, existentialism, social theory, Marxism, anthropology and...
and Philippe Sollers
Philippe Sollers
Philippe Sollers is a French writer and critic. In 1960 he founded the avant garde journal Tel Quel , published by Seuil, which ran until 1982...
(Michel Foucault's text was received late and therefore didn't appear as a preface). This book was banned from being publicized or sold to under-18s. A petition of international support was signed (notably by Pier Paolo Pasolini
Pier Paolo Pasolini
Pier Paolo Pasolini was an Italian film director, poet, writer, and intellectual. Pasolini distinguished himself as a poet, journalist, philosopher, linguist, novelist, playwright, filmmaker, newspaper and magazine columnist, actor, painter and political figure...
, Jean-Paul Sartre
Jean-Paul Sartre
Jean-Paul Charles Aymard Sartre was a French existentialist philosopher, playwright, novelist, screenwriter, political activist, biographer, and literary critic. He was one of the leading figures in 20th century French philosophy, particularly Marxism, and was one of the key figures in literary...
, Pierre Boulez
Pierre Boulez
Pierre Boulez is a French composer of contemporary classical music, a pianist, and a conductor.-Early years:Boulez was born in Montbrison, Loire, France. As a child he began piano lessons and demonstrated aptitude in both music and mathematics...
, Joseph Beuys
Joseph Beuys
Joseph Beuys was a German performance artist, sculptor, installation artist, graphic artist, art theorist and pedagogue of art.His extensive work is grounded in concepts of humanism, social philosophy and anthroposophy; it culminates in his "extended definition of art" and the idea of social...
, Pierre Dac
Pierre Dac
André Isaac , better known as Pierre Dac was a French humorist and Résistance activist.He was born in Châlons-sur-Marne and died in Paris....
, Jean Genet
Jean Genet
Jean Genet was a prominent and controversial French novelist, playwright, poet, essayist, and political activist. Early in his life he was a vagabond and petty criminal, but later took to writing...
, Joseph Kessel
Joseph Kessel
Joseph Kessel was a French journalist and novelist.He was born in Villa Clara, Entre Ríos, Argentina, because of the constant journeys of his father, a Lithuanian doctor of Jewish origin. Joseph Kessel lived the first years of his childhood in Orenburg, Russia, before the family moved to France...
, Maurice Blanchot
Maurice Blanchot
Maurice Blanchot was a French writer, philosopher, and literary theorist. His work had a strong influence on post-structuralist philosophers such as Jacques Derrida.-Works:...
, Max Ernst
Max Ernst
Max Ernst was a German painter, sculptor, graphic artist, and poet. A prolific artist, Ernst was one of the primary pioneers of the Dada movement and Surrealism.-Early life:...
, Italo Calvino
Italo Calvino
Italo Calvino was an Italian journalist and writer of short stories and novels. His best known works include the Our Ancestors trilogy , the Cosmicomics collection of short stories , and the novels Invisible Cities and If on a winter's night a traveler .Lionised in Britain and the United States,...
, Jacques Monod
Jacques Monod
Jacques Lucien Monod was a French biologist who was awarded a Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1965, sharing it with François Jacob and Andre Lwoff "for their discoveries concerning genetic control of enzyme and virus synthesis"...
, Simone de Beauvoir
Simone de Beauvoir
Simone-Ernestine-Lucie-Marie Bertrand de Beauvoir, often shortened to Simone de Beauvoir , was a French existentialist philosopher, public intellectual, and social theorist. She wrote novels, essays, biographies, an autobiography in several volumes, and monographs on philosophy, politics, and...
, and Nathalie Sarraute
Nathalie Sarraute
Nathalie Sarraute was a French lawyer and writer of Russian Jewish origin.-Life:Sarraute was born Natalia/Natacha Tcherniak in Ivanovo , 300 km north-east of Moscow in 1900 , and, following...
). François Mitterrand
François Mitterrand
François Maurice Adrien Marie Mitterrand was the 21st President of the French Republic and ex officio Co-Prince of Andorra, serving from 1981 until 1995. He is the longest-serving President of France and, as leader of the Socialist Party, the only figure from the left so far elected President...
, and Georges Pompidou
Georges Pompidou
Georges Jean Raymond Pompidou was a French politician. He was Prime Minister of France from 1962 to 1968, holding the longest tenure in this position, and later President of the French Republic from 1969 until his death in 1974.-Biography:...
tried to get the ban lifted but failed. Claude Simon
Claude Simon
Claude Simon was a French novelist and the 1985 Nobel Laureate in Literature. He was born in Antananarivo, Madagascar, and died in Paris, France....
(who won the Nobel Prize in 1985) resigned from the jury of the Prix Médicis
Prix Médicis
The Prix Médicis is a French literary award given each year in November. It was founded in 1958 by Gala Barbisan and Jean-Pierre Giraudoux. It is awarded to an author whose "fame does not yet match his talent."...
after the prize wasn't awarded to Eden, Eden, Eden.
In 1973, Guyotat's play Bond en avant ("Leap Forward") was performed. During the 70s Guyotat was involved in various diverse protests: for soldiers, immigrants, and prostitutes. One of those cases was of great importance for him: he personally helped Mohamed Laïd Moussa, an 24 years old Algerian ex-teacher who was accused and then found guilty of unintended murder in Marseille. One week after he came out of jail, Mohamed Laïd Moussa was murdered by a masked man; the event had a profound impact on Pierre Guyotat, who carried on the battle for a while.
In 1975 his novel Prostitution
Prostitution
Prostitution is the act or practice of providing sexual services to another person in return for payment. The person who receives payment for sexual services is called a prostitute and the person who receives such services is known by a multitude of terms, including a "john". Prostitution is one of...
came out (which incorporated Bond en avant as the final monologue). For now on, Guyotat's novels deal with a new kind of illegibility and obscenity. The fictions still explore the unthinkable possibility of worlds structured by sexual slavery and transgression of fundamental taboos. But French language is now unrecognizable, estranged by an extreme grammatical, syntactic and lexical creativity. Ellipses of letters or words, neologisms and phonetic transcriptions of Arabic speaking utterances make it difficult to understand. In the 1987 reedition of Prostitution, a 120 pages appendix - resume, glossary, "grammar" and translations - is added to the actual fiction and help the disoriented reader.
In 1977, while working on Le Livre (1984) and Histoire de Samora Machel (yet unpublished), he suffered a psychiatric illness. The depression and the deterioration of his physical and mental state culminated, in December 1981, in a coma.
On December 30, 1981, the ban on Eden, Eden, Eden was lifted.
From 1984 to 1986, Guyotat gave a series of readings and performances of his work all over Europe.
In January 2000 he was involved in the reopening of the Centre Georges Pompidou
Centre Georges Pompidou
Centre Georges Pompidou is a complex in the Beaubourg area of the 4th arrondissement of Paris, near Les Halles, rue Montorgueil and the Marais...
at Beaubourg, contributing a reading of the first pages of Progénitures. In 2005, Sur un cheval was reedited and in April 2005 it was read on Radio France under Alain Ollivier's direction.
Biography
- 2005 Carnets de bord volume 1 1962-1969. Ligne-Manifeste.
- 2005 "Essai biographique" by Catherine Brun, Editions Leo Scheer
Theatre
- 1972 Bond en avant, produced by Marcel BozonnetMarcel BozonnetMarcel-Louis Bozonnet is a French actor born in Semur-en-Auxois on the 18 May 1944.Bozonnet entered the Comédie-Française in 1982, and became a "sociétaire" in 1986...
and Alain Ollivier - 1987 Bivouac, produced by Alain Ollivier
- 2005 Sur un cheval with Valérie CrunchantValérie CrunchantValérie Crunchant is a French actress.She was born in Évry, Essonne, a suburb of Paris.Valérie Crunchant appears in All the fine promises , directed and written by Jean-Paul Civeyrac in which she was very graceful as the young Ghislaine.In Capitaine Achab directed by Philippe Ramos she...
and Mireille PerrierMireille PerrierMireille Perrier is a French actress. Her first starring role was in Leos Carax's Boy Meets Girl in 1983. Since then, Perrier has had major roles in other films such as Un monde sans pitié, Netchaïev est de retour, Toto le Héros, À vendre, Le Comptoir, Un dérangement considérable and...
. Reading directed by Alain Ollivier for France CultureFrance CultureFrance Culture is a French public radio channel and part of Radio France. Its programming encompasses a wide variety of features on historical, philosophical, sociopolitical, and scientific themes , as well as literary readings, radio plays, and experimental productions...
Novels
- 1961 Sur un cheval (Seuil, Paris).
- 1964 Ashby (Seuil, Paris).
- 1967 Tombeau pour cinq cent mille soldats (Gallimard, Paris).
- 1970 Eden, Eden, Eden (Gallimard, Paris).
- 1972 Littérature interdite (Gallimard, Paris).
- 1975 Prostitution (Gallimard, Paris).
- 1984 Le Livre (Gallimard, Paris) et Vivre (Denoël, Paris).
- 1995 Wanted Female, with Sam Francis (Lapis Press, Los Angeles).
- 2000 Progénitures (Gallimard, Paris) and Explications (Léo Scheer).
External links
- The inhuman work of Pierre Guyotat by John Taylor for the TLS
- Recordings of Guyotat reading his work (in French) hosted by UbuWebUbuWebUbuWeb is a large web-based educational resource for avant-garde material available on the internet, founded in 1996 by poet Kenneth Goldsmith. It offers visual, concrete and sound poetry, expanding to include film and sound art mp3 archives.-Philosophy:...
.