|
Le Monde's 100 Books Of The Century
The 100 Books of the Century () is a list of the hundred most memorable books of the 20th century, regardless of language, according to a poll performed during the spring of 1999 by the French retailer Fnac and the Paris newspaper ''Le Monde''. Overview Starting from a preliminary list of 200 titles created by bookshops and journalists, 17,000 French participants responded to the question, "Which books have stuck in your mind?" (''Quels livres sont restés dans votre mémoire?'') As ''Le Monde'' journalist Josyane Savigneau aptly clarified in her article, the list is not meant to encompass the 100 most distinguished French literary works of the 20th century, but rather to reflect the emotional connections of the French populace. The list includes both classic novels and genre fiction (Tolkien, Agatha Christie, A. C. Doyle), as well as poetry, drama and nonfiction literature (Freud's essays and the diary of Anne Frank). There are also comic books on the list, one album from each ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Fnac
Fnac () is a French multinational retail chain specializing in the sale of entertainment Media (communication), media and consumer electronics. Fnac was founded by André Essel and Max Théret in 1954. Its headquarters is located in ''Le Flavia'' in Ivry-sur-Seine near Paris. Its name is an abbreviation of ''Fédération Nationale d’Achats des Cadres'' ("National Purchasing Federation for Cadres"). It merged with Darty in 2016 to become Groupe Fnac Darty. History Max Théret had a passion for photography which began in 1932. Hunted by the Gestapo, Théret left the Zone occupée, Occupied Zone in 1942, moving to Grenoble, where he took up photography as a career. After the war, he trained as a photo laboratory technician, founded his own laboratory, and later constructed the first colour-processing machine in France. In 1951, while working for the Postes, télégraphes et téléphones (France), telephone company, he founded Economie Nouvelle, a membership discount buying group f ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
1913 In Literature
This article contains information about the literary events and publications of 1913. Events *January – Acmeist poetry, with roots back to 1909, is officially born as a reaction to Russian Futurism. Manifestos are printed in the journal ''Apollon'' by Nikolay Gumilyov and Sergey Gorodetsky, with illustrative works by both, and by Anna Akhmatova, Vladimir Narbut, and Osip Mandelstam — the last with "Hagia Sophia". *January 1 – The German National Library is founded in Leipzig. *January 8 – Harold Monro officially opens the Poetry Bookshop in London (opened for business November 1912), which becomes a noted international literary meeting-place. *January 24 – Franz Kafka stops working on his novel ''Amerika'', which he never finishes. *March 24 – The new Palace Theatre opens at 1564 Broadway (at West 47th Street) in midtown Manhattan, New York City. *April 5 – Serialization of the adventures of Gaston Leroux's character Chéri-Bibi begins in ''Le Matin'' (France) ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
1932 In Literature
This article contains information about the literary events and publications of 1932. Events *March – Captain W. E. Johns' character Biggles (James Bigglesworth) is introduced as an English World War I pilot in the short story "The White Fokker", in the first, April, issue of ''Popular Flying'' magazine, edited by Johns. The first Biggles collection, ''The Sopwith Camel, Camels Are Coming'', ensues in April. *April 23 – To mark Shakespeare's birthday: **The Royal Shakespeare Company's Royal Shakespeare Theatre, new theatre opens at Stratford-upon-Avon. **The Folger Shakespeare Library opens in Washington, D.C. *April 26 – The 32-year-old American poet Hart Crane, in a state of alcoholic depression, throws himself overboard from the ''USS Orizaba, Orizaba'' between Mexico and New York; his body is never recovered. *May – The first issue appears of the English journal of literary criticism ''Scrutiny (journal), Scrutiny: a quarterly review'', edited by F. R. Leavis. *June ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Louis-Ferdinand Céline
Louis Ferdinand Auguste Destouches (27 May 1894 – 1 July 1961), better known by the pen name Louis-Ferdinand Céline ( ; ), was a French novelist, polemicist, and physician. His first novel '' Journey to the End of the Night'' (1932) won the ''Prix Renaudot'' but divided critics due to the author's pessimistic depiction of the human condition and his writing style based on working-class speech. In subsequent novels such as '' Death on the Installment Plan'' (1936), '' Guignol's Band'' (1944) and '' Castle to Castle'' (1957), Céline further developed an innovative and distinctive literary style. Maurice Nadeau wrote: "What Joyce did for the English language...what the surrealists attempted to do for the French language, Céline achieved effortlessly and on a vast scale." From 1937 Céline wrote a series of antisemitic polemical works in which he advocated a military alliance with Nazi Germany. He continued to publicly espouse antisemitic views during the German occupation of ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Journey To The End Of The Night
''Journey to the End of the Night'' (, 1932) is the first novel by Louis-Ferdinand Céline. This semi-autobiographical work follows the adventures of Ferdinand Bardamu in World War I, colonial Africa, the United States and the poor suburbs of Paris where he works as a doctor. The novel won the ''Prix Renaudot'' in 1932 but divided critics due to the author's pessimistic depiction of the human condition and his innovative writing style based on working class speech, slang and neologisms. It is now widely considered to be one of the greatest novels of the twentieth century. Background Céline began writing ''Journey to the End of the Night'', his first novel, in 1929 while he was working as a doctor in a public clinic in the working class Paris suburb of Clichy. The novel draws on his experience in the French cavalry during World War One, his time in colonial Africa as an employee of a French forestry company, his 1925 visit to the United States as a health officer with the L ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
1933 In Literature
Events January * January 11 – Australian aviator Sir Charles Kingsford Smith makes the first commercial flight between Australia and New Zealand. * January 17 – The United States Congress votes in favour of Philippines independence, against the wishes of U.S. President Herbert Hoover. * January 28 – "Pakistan Declaration": Choudhry Rahmat Ali publishes (in Cambridge, UK) a pamphlet entitled ''Now or Never; Are We to Live or Perish Forever?'', in which he calls for the creation of a Muslim state in northwest India that he calls " Pakstan"; this influences the Pakistan Movement. * January 30 ** Nazi Party leader Adolf Hitler is appointed Chancellor of Germany by President of Germany Paul von Hindenburg. ** Édouard Daladier forms a government in France in succession to Joseph Paul-Boncour. He is succeeded on October 26 by Albert Sarraut and on November 26 by Camille Chautemps. February * February 1 – Adolf Hitler gives his "Proclamation to the German Peop ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
André Malraux
Georges André Malraux ( ; ; 3 November 1901 – 23 November 1976) was a French novelist, art theorist, and minister of cultural affairs. Malraux's novel ''La Condition Humaine'' (''Man's Fate'') (1933) won the Prix Goncourt. He was appointed by President Charles de Gaulle as information minister (1945–46) and subsequently as France's first cultural affairs minister during de Gaulle's presidency (1959–1969). Early years Malraux was born in Paris in 1901, the son of Fernand-Georges Malraux (1875–1930) and Berthe Félicie Lamy (1877–1932). His parents separated in 1905 and eventually divorced. There are suggestions that Malraux's paternal grandfather committed suicide in 1909."Biographie détaillée" , André Malraux Website, accessed 3 September 2010 Malraux was raised by his mother, his mate ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Man's Fate
''Man's Fate'' (French: ''La Condition humaine'', "The Human Condition") is a 1933 novel written by André Malraux about the failed communist insurrection in Shanghai in 1927, and the existential quandaries facing a diverse group of people associated with the revolution. Along with Les Conquérants (1928 – "The Conquerors") and La Voie Royale (1930 – "The Royal Way"), it forms a trilogy on revolution in Asia. The novel was translated into English twice, both translations appearing in 1934, one by Haakon Chevalier under the title ''Man's Fate'', published by Harrison Smith & Robert Haas in New York and republished by Random House as part of their Modern Library from 1936 on, and the other by Alastair MacDonald under the title ''Storm in Shanghai'', published by Methuen in London and republished, still by Methuen, in 1948 as ''Man's Estate'', to become a Penguin pocket in 1961. Currently the Chevalier translation is the only one still in regular print. In 1958 Hannah Arendt ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
1943 In Literature
This article contains information about the literary events and publications of 1943. Events *January 4 – Thomas Mann completes ''Joseph der Ernährer'' (Joseph the Provider) in California, the last of his '' Joseph and His Brothers (Joseph und seine Brüder)'' tetralogy, on which he began in December 1926. *February 4 – The première of Bertolt Brecht's '' The Good Person of Szechwan (Der gute Mensch von Sezuan)'' takes place at the Schauspielhaus Zürich in Switzerland, with Leonard Steckel directing. *March – The self-illustrated children's novella '' The Little Prince'' by the exiled French aviator Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, the all-time best-selling book originated in French, is published in New York. *May – A strongly antisemitic production of Shakespeare's '' The Merchant of Venice'' is staged at the Burgtheater in Vienna, at the command of the city's Gauleiter, with Werner Krauss as Shylock. * June 30 – Having transferred from the Merchant Marine to ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Antoine De Saint-Exupéry
Antoine Marie Jean-Baptiste Roger, vicomte de Saint-Exupéry (29 June 1900 – 31 July 1944), known simply as Antoine de Saint-Exupéry (, , ), was a French writer, poet, journalist and aviator. Born in Lyon to an French nobility, aristocratic family, Saint-Exupéry trained as a commercial pilot in the early 1920s, working airmail routes across Europe, Africa, and South America. Between 1926 and 1939, four of his literary works were published: the short story ''The Aviator (short story), The Aviator'', novels ''Courrier sud (novel), Southern Mail'' and ''Night Flight (novel), Night Flight'', and the memoir ''Wind, Sand and Stars''. Saint-Exupéry joined the French Air Force for World War II and flew reconnaissance missions until Armistice of 22 June 1940, France's armistice with Germany in 1940. After being demobilised by the Air Force, Saint-Exupéry lived in exile in the United States between 1941 and 1943 and helped persuade it to enter the war. During this time, his works '' ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Little Prince
''The Little Prince'' (, ) is a novella written and illustrated by French writer and aviator Antoine de Saint-Exupéry. It was first published in English and French in the United States by Reynal & Hitchcock in April 1943 and was published posthumously in France following liberation; Saint-Exupéry's works had been banned by the Vichy Regime. The story follows a young prince who visits various planets, including Earth, and addresses themes of loneliness, friendship, love, and loss. Despite its style as a children's book, ''The Little Prince'' makes observations about life, adults, and human nature. ''The Little Prince'' became Saint-Exupéry's most successful work, selling an estimated 140 million copies worldwide, which makes it one of the best-selling in history. The book has been translated into over 505 different languages and dialects worldwide, being the second most translated work ever published, trailing only the Bible. ''The Little Prince'' has been adapted to nu ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
1925 In Literature
This article contains information about the literary events and publications of 1925. Events * February 21 – The first issue of ''The New Yorker'' magazine is published by Harold Ross. * February 28 – The first story under the name B. Traven (identified variously as actor Ret Marut or Otto Feige) is published, in ''Vorwärts'' (Berlin). * April – F. Scott Fitzgerald and Ernest Hemingway meet in the Dingo Bar, rue Delambre, in the Montparnasse quarter of Paris, after the April 10 publication of Fitzgerald's ''The Great Gatsby'' (by Charles Scribner's Sons in New York City) and before Hemingway departs on a trip to Spain that he will fictionalize in ''The Sun Also Rises'' (1926). * May 14 – Virginia Woolf's novel ''Mrs Dalloway'' is published by the Hogarth Press in Bloomsbury, London. Woolf is beginning work on ''To the Lighthouse''. * May 20 – C. S. Lewis is elected a fellow of Magdalen College, Oxford, where he tutors in English language and literature until 1954. * ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
