Jean de Brunhoff (; 9 December 1899 – 16 October 1937) was a French writer and

illustrator An illustrator is an artist who specializes in enhancing writing or elucidating concepts by providing a visual representation that corresponds to the content of the associated text or idea. The illustration may be intended to clarify complic ...

remembered best for creating the

Babar Babar ( ur, ), also variously spelled as Baber, Babur, and Babor is a male given name of Pashto, and Persian origin, and a popular male given name in Pakistan. It is generally taken in reference to the Persian ''babr'' (Persian: ببر), meanin ...

series of children's books concerning a fictional elephant, the first of which was published in 1931.

Early life

De Brunhoff was the fourth and youngest child of Maurice de Brunhoff, a publisher, and his wife Marguerite. He attended

Protestant Protestantism is a Christian denomination, branch of Christianity that follows the theological tenets of the Reformation, Protestant Reformation, a movement that began seeking to reform the Catholic Church from within in the 16th century agai ...

schools, including the prestigious École Alsacienne. Brunhoff joined the army and was sent to the front when

World War I World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was List of wars and anthropogenic disasters by death toll, one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, ...

was almost over. Afterward, he decided to be a professional artist and studied painting at the

Académie de la Grande Chaumière The Académie de la Grande Chaumière is an art school in the Montparnasse district of Paris, France. History The school was founded in 1904 by the Catalan painter Claudio Castelucho on the rue de la Grande Chaumière in Paris, near the Acad� ...

in Paris. In 1924, he married Cécile Sabouraud, a talented pianist, and they had two sons,

Laurent Laurent may refer to: *Laurent (name), a French masculine given name and a surname **Saint Laurence (aka: Saint ''Laurent''), the martyr Laurent **Pierre Alphonse Laurent, mathematician **Joseph Jean Pierre Laurent, amateur astronomer, discoverer ...

and Mathieu, born in 1925 and 1926; a third son, Thierry, was born nine years later.

Babar

The Babar books began as a

bedtime story A bedtime story is a traditional form of storytelling, where a story is told to a child at bedtime to prepare the child for sleep. The bedtime story has long been considered "a definite institution in many families".Dickson, Marguerite Stockma ...

that Cécile de Brunhoff invented for their children, Mathieu and Laurent, when they were four and five years old, respectively. She was allegedly trying to comfort Mathieu, who was sick. The boys liked the story of the little elephant who left the jungle for a city resembling Paris so much that they asked their father, a painter, to illustrate it. He made it into a picture book, with text, which was published by a family-owned publishing house, ''

Le Jardin des Modes ''Le Jardin des Modes'' was a French language women's fashion magazine published monthly in France between 1922 and 1997. History and profile The magazine was first published in April 1922 as ''L'Illustration des Modes'' and aimed to a cutting ed ...

''. Originally, it was planned that the book's title page would describe the story as ''told by Jean and Cécile de Brunhoff''. However, she had her name omitted. Due to the role she played in the genesis of the Babar story, some sources refer to her as the creator of the Babar story. After the first book'' Histoire de Babar'' (''The Story of Babar''), five more titles followed before Jean de Brunhoff died of

tuberculosis Tuberculosis (TB) is an infectious disease usually caused by '' Mycobacterium tuberculosis'' (MTB) bacteria. Tuberculosis generally affects the lungs, but it can also affect other parts of the body. Most infections show no symptoms, ...

at the age of 37. He is buried in

Père Lachaise Cemetery Père Lachaise Cemetery (french: Cimetière du Père-Lachaise ; formerly , "East Cemetery") is the largest cemetery in Paris, France (). With more than 3.5 million visitors annually, it is the most visited necropolis in the world. Notable figure ...

in Paris. After Jean's death, his brother Michel de Brunhoff, who was the editor of the magazine

Vogue Paris The French edition of ''Vogue'' magazine, formerly called ''Vogue Paris'', is a fashion magazine that has been published since 1920. History 1920–54 The French edition of ''Vogue'' was first issued on 15 June 1920, the first editor-in-chief b ...

, oversaw the publication in book form of Jean's two last books, ''Babar and His Children'' and ''Babar and Father Christmas'', both of which had been drawn in

black and white Black-and-white (B&W or B/W) images combine black and white in a continuous spectrum, producing a range of shades of grey. Media The history of various visual media began with black and white, and as technology improved, altered to color. ...

for a British newspaper, ''

The Daily Sketch The ''Daily Sketch'' was a British national tabloid newspaper, founded in Manchester in 1909 by Sir Edward Hulton. It was bought in 1920 by Lord Rothermere's Daily Mirror Newspapers, but in 1925 Rothermere sold it to William and Gomer Be ...

''. Michel de Brunhoff arranged for the black and white drawings to be painted in color, with the then-thirteen-year-old Laurent helping with the work. The French publishing house

Hachette Hachette may refer to: * Hachette (surname) * Hachette (publisher), a French publisher, the imprint of Lagardère Publishing ** Hachette Book Group, the American subsidiary ** Hachette Distribution Services, the distribution arm See also * Hachett ...

later bought the rights to the Babar series. The first six Babar books were reprinted with millions of copies sold around the world.

Babar revived

Soon after the end of

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 World War II by country, vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great power ...

, Laurent, who had become an artistic painter like his father and had also studied at the

, began work on a Babar book of his own. Although his style of painting was different from his father's and he emphasized picture more than text in the creation of his books, he trained himself to draw elephants in strict accord with the style of his father. Consequently, many people did not notice any difference in authorship and assumed the six-year gap in the series was because of the war. Laurent has always been careful to emphasize that Babar was his father's creation (and to some extent his mother's) and that he continued the series largely as a way of keeping the memory of his father and his own childhood alive.

Death

Jean de Brunhoff died on October 16, 1937, from

Bibliography

*''The Story of Babar''. New York:

Harrison Smith and Robert Haas Random House is an American book publisher and the largest general-interest paperback publisher in the world. The company has several independently managed subsidiaries around the world. It is part of Penguin Random House, which is owned by Germ ...

, 1934 *''The Travels of Babar''. New York: Harrison Smith and Robert Haas, 1934 *''Babar the King''. New York: Harrison Smith and Robert Haas, 1935 *''A.B.C. of Babar''. New York:

Random House Random House is an American book publisher and the largest general-interest paperback publisher in the world. The company has several independently managed subsidiaries around the world. It is part of Penguin Random House, which is owned by Germ ...

, 1936 (out of print) *''Zephir's Holidays'' (also published as ''Babar and Zephir'' and ''Babar's Friend Zephir''Sally's Reviews: ''Babar's Friend Zephir'', https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/54338395). New York: Random House, 1937 *''Babar and His Children''. New York: Random House, 1938 *''Babar and Father Christmas''. New York: Random House, 1940

References

External links

Lambiek Comiclopedia article about Jean de Brunhoff.
{{DEFAULTSORT:Brunhoff, Jean De 1899 births 1937 deaths Writers from Paris French Army soldiers French military personnel of World War I Burials at Père Lachaise Cemetery 20th-century deaths from tuberculosis French children's writers French children's book illustrators French illustrators Writers who illustrated their own writing Tuberculosis deaths in Switzerland Alumni of the Académie de la Grande Chaumière French male non-fiction writers Babar the Elephant