Andrée Viollis (9 December 1870 – 9 August 1950) was a French journalist and writer. A prominent figure in news journalism and major reporting, she was an anti-fascist and feminist activist who was part of the French group associated with the

World Committee Against War and Fascism The World Committee Against War and Fascism was an international organization sponsored by the Communist International, that was active in the struggle against Fascism in the 1930s. During this period Adolf Hitler came to power in Germany, Italy in ...

. Viollis worked for various newspapers, including '' La Fronde'', ''

L'Écho de Paris ''L'Écho de Paris'' was a daily newspaper in Paris from 1884 to 1944. The paper's editorial stance was initially conservative and nationalistic, but it later became close to the French Social Party. Its writers included Octave Mirbeau, Henri d ...

'', ''Excelsior'', ''

Le Petit Parisien ''Le Petit Parisien'' was a prominent French newspaper during the French Third Republic. It was published between 1876 and 1944, and its circulation was over two million after the First World War. Publishing Despite its name, the paper was circu ...

'', ''

The Times ''The Times'' is a British daily national newspaper based in London. It began in 1785 under the title ''The Daily Universal Register'', adopting its current name on 1 January 1788. ''The Times'' and its sister paper '' The Sunday Times'' (f ...

'', '' Daily Mail'', ''Vendredi'', ''Ce soir'', and ''L'Humanité''. She received several awards, including the

Legion of Honour The National Order of the Legion of Honour (french: Ordre national de la Légion d'honneur), formerly the Royal Order of the Legion of Honour ('), is the highest French order of merit, both military and civil. Established in 1802 by Napoleon ...

Early life and education

Andrée Françoise Claudius Jacquet de la Verryere was born in

Mées Mées (; oc, Mers) is a commune in the Landes department in Nouvelle-Aquitaine in south-western France. Notable people * Andrée Viollis (1870–1950), journalist and writer See also *Communes of the Landes department The following is a li ...

on 9 December 1870 to a cultivated bourgeois family. After obtaining her baccalaureate, she studied at the

Sorbonne Sorbonne may refer to: * Sorbonne (building), historic building in Paris, which housed the University of Paris and is now shared among multiple universities. *the University of Paris (c. 1150 – 1970) *one of its components or linked institution, ...

and graduated from the

University of Oxford , mottoeng = The Lord is my light , established = , endowment = £6.1 billion (including colleges) (2019) , budget = £2.145 billion (2019–20) , chancellor ...

Career

After graduation, she turned to journalism and made her debut in the feminist newspaper La Fronde, directed by

Marguerite Durand Marguerite Durand (24 January 1864 – 16 March 1936) was a French stage actress, journalist, and a leading suffragette. She founded her own newspaper, and ran for election. She is also known for having a pet lion. For her contributions to t ...

. She married Gustave Téry, professor of philosophy, with whom she had two children, including Simone Téry. In 1903, when Simone was four, Andree divorced Gustave. In 1905, she married Henri d'Ardenne de Tizac, curator of the

Musée Cernuschi The Musée Cernuschi (; 'Cernuschi Museum'), officially also the ('Asian Arts Museum of the City of Paris'), is an Asian art museum located at 7 avenue Vélasquez, near Parc Monceau, in Paris, France. Its Asian art collection is second in Pari ...

and author of novels under the pseudonym of Jean Viollis. They had two other children. With her second husband, she became involved in literary journalism as a critic, columnist, serialist, and storyteller; they also co-authored novels. Viollis affiliated with ''L'Écho de Paris'' and ''Excelsior'', writing in favor of women's emancipation and the rights of the mother. From 1914, she worked at the newspaper ''Le Petit Parisien'', staying twenty years, where she turned to major reporting and covered diverse areas, including sporting events, major trials, political interviews, and war correspondence. During

World War I World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...

, for the period of 1914 to 1916, she served as a nurse at the front, as well as at

Bar-le-Duc Bar-le-Duc (), formerly known as Bar, is a Communes of France, commune in the Meuse (department), Meuse Departments of France, département, of which it is the capital. The department is in Grand Est in northeastern France. The lower, more moder ...

and

Sainte-Menehould Sainte-Menehould (; german: Sankt Mathilde) is a commune in the Marne department in north-eastern France. The 18th-century French playwright Charles-Georges Fenouillot de Falbaire de Quingey (1727–1800) died in Sainte-Ménéhould. It was the ...

. In 1919 and until 1922, she served as editorial assistant to ''The Times'' and the ''Daily Mail''. She investigated the

USSR The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen nationa ...

of 1927 ten years after the

Bolshevik Revolution The October Revolution,. officially known as the Great October Socialist Revolution. in the Soviet Union, also known as the Bolshevik Revolution, was a revolution in Russia led by the Bolshevik Party of Vladimir Lenin that was a key moment ...

, testified to the Afghan civil war in 1929, to the Indian revolt in 1930, accompanied the Minister for the Colonies,

Paul Reynaud Paul Reynaud (; 15 October 1878 – 21 September 1966) was a French politician and lawyer prominent in the interwar period, noted for his stances on economic liberalism and militant opposition to Germany. Reynaud opposed the Munich Agreement of ...

Indochina Mainland Southeast Asia, also known as the Indochinese Peninsula or Indochina, is the continental portion of Southeast Asia. It lies east of the Indian subcontinent and south of Mainland China and is bordered by the Indian Ocean to the west an ...

in 1931, and followed in 1932 the Shanghai incident. During the

Popular Front A popular front is "any coalition of working-class and middle-class parties", including liberal and social democratic ones, "united for the defense of democratic forms" against "a presumed Fascist assault". More generally, it is "a coalition ...

, she joined forces with anti-fascist intellectuals. With the support of

André Chamson André Chamson (6 June 1900 – 9 November 1983) was a French archivist, novelist and essayist. He was nominated for the Nobel Prize in Literature. He was the father of the novelist . Biography Chamson was born at Nîmes, Gard. Having studi ...

and

Jean Guéhenno Jean Guéhenno born Marcel-Jules-Marie Guéhenno (25 March 1890 – 22 September 1978) was a French essayist, writer and literary critic. Life and career Jean Guéhenno, writer and educator, was a prominent contributor to the NRF. He was edito ...

, she became the director of the weekly political-literary ''Vendredi'', where she defended the cause of the

Spanish Republic The Spanish Republic (), commonly known as the Second Spanish Republic (), was the form of government in Spain from 1931 to 1939. The Republic was proclaimed on 14 April 1931, after the deposition of King Alfonso XIII, and was dissolved on 1 A ...

and of the victims of French colonization. Viollis was part of the French group associated with the

. In 1936, in

Paris Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), ma ...

, she chaired the first congress of the Union des jeunes filles de France. In 1938, she joined the editorial staff of the communist daily '' Ce soir'', directed by

Louis Aragon Louis Aragon (, , 3 October 1897 – 24 December 1982) was a French poet who was one of the leading voices of the surrealist movement in France. He co-founded with André Breton and Philippe Soupault the surrealist review ''Littérature''. He ...

and

Jean-Richard Bloch Jean-Richard Bloch (25 May 1884 – 15 March 1947) was a French critic, novelist and playwright. He was a member of the French Communist Party (PCF) and worked with Louis Aragon in the evening daily '' Ce soir''. Early life Bloch was born ...

. After ''Vendredi'' ended publication in November 1938, she joined ''La Lumière'', along with Louis Martin-Chauffier and André Wurmser. Close to communist intellectual circles, she joined the Resistance in the southern zone during

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposing ...

, and put her journalist experience to work for this commitment, spending the war years in

Lyon Lyon,, ; Occitan language, Occitan: ''Lion'', hist. ''Lionés'' also spelled in English as Lyons, is the List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, third-largest city and Urban area (France), second-largest metropolitan area of F ...

and

Dieulefit Dieulefit (; ''Dieulofé'', from Old Occitan ''Dieu lo fe'' "God made it") is a commune in the Drôme department in southeastern France. Population See also *Communes of the Drôme department The following is a list of the 363 communes of ...

Later life and death

In 1945, Andrée Viollis worked again with ''Ce soir''. She also collaborated with some publications of the communist movement. She took up major reports, which leads her to travel to

South Africa South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa (RSA), is the Southern Africa, southernmost country in Africa. It is bounded to the south by of coastline that stretch along the Atlantic Ocean, South Atlantic and Indian Oceans; to the ...

. In the same year, she was sent by ''L'Humanité'' to the United States to cover the French section of the Office of War Information. Viollis died in

on 9 August 1950. She was interred in the Montparnasse Cemetery. Her grave does not include a date of birth.

Selected works

* ''Criquet'', Calmann-Lévy, 1913 * ''Lord Northcliffe'', B. Grasset, 1919 * ''La perdrix dorée'', Baudinière coll. "Les Maîtres de la plume", 1925 * ''La Vraie Mme de La Fayette'', Bloud et Gay, 1926 * ''Seule en Russie, de la Baltique à la Caspienne'', Gallimard, 1927 * ''Alsace et Lorraine au-dessus des passions'', V. Attinger coll. "Occident", 1928 * ''L'Inde contre les Anglais'', Éd. des portiques, 1930 * ''Tourmente sur l'Afghanistan'', Librairie Valois, coll. "Explorations du monde nouveau", 1930 * ''Changhaï et le destin de la Chine'', R.-A. Corrêa, coll. "Faits et gestes", 1933 (Introduction de Henri Rohrer) * ''Le Japon et son empire'', B. Grasset, coll. "Les Ecrits", 1933 * ''Le Japon intime'', F. Aubier, coll. "des Documents", 1934 * ''Le Conflit sino-japonais'', M. Maupoint, 1938 * ''Notre Tunisie'', Gallimard, 1939 * ''Le Racisme hitlérien, machine de guerre contre la France'', 1943 * ''Le Secret de la reine Christine'', Éditions Agence Gutenberg, coll. "Les Vies illustres romancées", 1944 * ''Puycerrampion'' (avec Jean Viollis), la Bibliothèque française, 1947 * ''L'Afrique du Sud, cette inconnue'', Hachette, coll. "Choses vues, aventures vécues", 1948

References

Bibliography

* Anne Renoult,
Presses Universitaires de Rennes - ''Andrée Viollis: une femme journaliste''
coll. "Mnémosyne", 2004 . (in French) * Alice-Anne Jeandel, ''Andrée Viollis: Une femme grand reporter, une écriture de l'événement 1927-1939'', Inter-National, 2006
l'Harmattan
(in French)

(in French)

External links

Andrée VIOLLIS, Indochine S.O.S., Paris, NRF, 1935, 240 p.
by www.entreprises-coloniales.fr, published 17 December 2017, updated 6 April 2019. (in French) {{DEFAULTSORT:Viollis, Andree 1870 births 1950 deaths 20th-century French journalists 20th-century French women writers People from Landes (department) University of Paris alumni Alumni of the University of Oxford French Resistance members Burials at Montparnasse Cemetery French feminists French translators Recipients of the Legion of Honour Female nurses in World War I