J. M. G. Le Clézio

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J.M.G. Le Clézio
Born	Jean-Marie Gustave Le Clézio 13 April 1940 (1940-04-13) (age 69) Nice, France
Occupation	Writer
Nationality	French
Ethnicity	French
Citizenship	French & Mauritian
Writing period	1963 -
Genres	novel, short story, essay, translation
Subjects	Exile, Migration, Childhood, Ecology
Notable work(s)	Le Procès-Verbal, Désert
Notable award(s)	Nobel Prize in Literature 2008
Influences Euclides da Cunha, Robert Louis Stevenson

Jean-Marie Gustave Le Clézio born 13 April 1940 writing under the name J. M. G. Le Clézio, is a French author and Nobel laureate. The author of over forty works, he was awarded the 1963 prix Renaudot for his novel Le Procès-Verbal.

Contents 1 Biography 1.1 Nationality 1.2 Childhood 1.3 Education 1.4 Teaching career 2 Works and writing 2.1 Writing style from 1963 to 1975 2.2 Writing style after the mid 70's 3 Nobel Prize 4 Bibliography 4.1 Novels 4.2 Essays 4.3 Short stories 4.4 Travel Diaries 4.5 Collections Translated by the Author into French. 4.6 Books for Children 5 Awards and honours 5.1 Awards 5.2 Honours 6 References 7 External links

[edit] Biography

[edit] Nationality

Le Clézio was born in the French Riviera city of Nice, his mother's native city during World War II when his father was serving in the British army in Nigeria.^[1] The Le Clézio family both on his father's and his mother's side were originally from the Morbihan on the west coast of Brittany^[2], but Le Clézio's more immediate roots lie on the island of Mauritius where François Alexis Le Clézio settled with his wife and daughter in 1798. Although Le Clézio never lived in Mauritius for more than a few months at a time, he regards himself both as a Frenchman^[3] and a Mauritian.^[4] Le Clézio has dual French and Mauritian citizenship and calls Mauritius his "little fatherland".^[5][6]

[edit] Childhood

Le Clézio was brought up in Roquebillière, a small village near Nice in Italian-occupied France until 1948 when he, his mother and his brother boarded a ship set to meet up with his father in Nigeria. Le Clézio drew on some of his experiences when he wrote the semi-autobiographical novel Onitsha in 1991. In an essay written in 2004, he wrote in a more autobiographical style about his childhood in Nigeria and his relationship with his parents.

[edit] Education

After studying at University of Bristol in England from 1958 to 1959^[7], he finished his undergraduate degree at Nice's Institut d’études littéraires. After several years spent in London and Bristol, he moved to the United States to work as a teacher. In 1967 he served in the French military in Thailand, but was quickly expelled from the country for protesting against child prostitution and sent to Mexico to finish his military obligation. From 1970 to 1974, he lived with the Embera-Wounaan tribe in Panama.

Le Clézio earned a master's degree with a thesis on Henri Michaux from the University of Provence in 1964,^[8] and wrote a doctoral thesis in 1983 on Mexico’s early history for the University of Perpignan (he is a specialist on Michoacán). He has been married since 1975 to Jémia, who is Moroccan, and has three daughters (one by a first marriage). Since the 1990s they have divided their residence between Albuquerque, Mauritius, and Nice.^[9]

[edit] Teaching career

He has taught at a number of universities around the world. A frequent visitor to South Korea, he taught French language and literature at Ewha Womans University in Seoul for two semesters in 2007 and 2008.^[10][11]

[edit] Works and writing

Le Clézio has been writing since age seven; his first work was a book about the sea. After majoring in French literature, he became well-known at age 23 with the publication of his first novel Le Procès-Verbal (The Interrogation), which was shortlisted for the Prix Goncourt and for which he was awarded the Prix Renaudot in 1963.^[6] Since then he has published more than thirty-six books, including short stories, novels, essays, two translations on the subject of Native American mythology, prefaces and reviews as well as contributions to collective publications. He is also the author of several children's books.

[edit] Writing style from 1963 to 1975

From 1963 to 1975, Le Clézio explored themes such as insanity, language, writing and devoted himself to formal experimentation in the wake of such contemporaries as Georges Perec or Michel Butor. His public image was that of an innovator and a rebel, drawing praise from Michel Foucault and Gilles Deleuze.

[edit] Writing style after the mid 70's

In the late 1970s, Le Clézio's style underwent a drastic change; he abandoned experimentation, and the mood of his novels became less tormented as he broached themes like childhood, adolescence, and traveling, which attracted a broader, more popular audience. In 1980, Le Clézio was the first winner of the newly created Grand Prix Paul Morand, awarded to Désert by the Académie Française.^[12] In 1994, a survey conducted by the French literary magazine Lire showed that 13 percent of the readers considered him to be the greatest living French language writer.^[13]

[edit] Nobel Prize

The Nobel Prize in Literature in 2008 went to Le Clézio for works characterized by the Swedish Academy as being "poetic adventure and sensual ecstasy" and for being focused on the environment, especially the desert.^[14] The Swedish Academy, in announcing the award, called Le Clézio an "author of new departures, poetic adventure and sensual ecstasy, explorer of a humanity beyond and below the reigning civilization."^[15]. Le Clézio used his Nobel lecture to attack the subject of information poverty^[16]. The title of his lecture was Dans la forêt des paradoxes, translated as In the forest of paradoxes.^[17]

Gao Xingjian, a Chinese émigré, was the last French citizen to receive the prize (in 2000); Le Clézio was the first French-language writer to receive the Nobel Prize in Literature since Claude Simon in 1985, and the fourteenth since Sully Prudhomme, laureate of the first edition in 1901.

[edit] Bibliography

All works are written and published in French. If the work has been translated into English, the English title is given in parenthesis.

[edit] Novels

• Le Procès-Verbal (The Interrogation)
• Le Jour où Beaumont fit connaissance avec sa douleur
• Le Livre des fuites (The Book of Flights: An Adventure Story)
• Le déluge (The Flood)
• Terra amata (Terra amata)
• La Guerre (War)
• Voyages de l'autre côté
• Désert (Desert)
• Le Chercheur d'or (The prospector)
• Étoile errante (Wandering Star : a Novel)
• Onitsha (Onitsha)
• La Quarantaine
• Poisson d'or
• Hasard suivi de Angoli Mala
• Fantômes dans la rue
• Révolutions
• Ourania
• Ritournelle de la faim

[edit] Essays

• Le Rêve mexicain ou la pensée interrompue (The Mexican Dream, Or, The Interrupted Thought of Amerindian Civilizations)
• Conversations avec J.M.G. Le Clézio
• Haï
• Mydriase
• Vers les icebergs (Essai sur Henri Michaux)
• L'Inconnu sur la Terre
• Trois Villes saintes
• Dans la maison d'Edith
• Sur Lautréamont
• Diego et Frida
• Ailleurs
• Enfances
• Le Llano en flammes
• L'Extase matérielle
• L’Africain
• Une lettre de J.M.G. Le Clezio
• Ballaciner
• La liberté pour Rêver (Freedom to Dream)
  and
• La liberté pour parler (Freedom to Speak)
• Sur la lecture comme le vrai voyage (On reading as true travel)

[edit] Short stories

• La Fièvre (Fever)
• Mondo et autres histoires
• La ronde et autres faits divers (The Round & Other Cold Hard Facts )
• Printemps et autres saisons
• Awaité Pawana (Pawana)
• La Fête chantée et autres essais de thème amérindien
• Cœur brûle et autres romances
• Tabataba suivi de pawana

[edit] Travel Diaries

• Voyage à Rodrigues
• Gens des nuages
• Raga. Approche du continent invisible

[edit] Collections Translated by the Author into French.

• Les Prophéties du Chilam Balam
• Relation de Michoacan
• Sirandanes

[edit] Books for Children

• Celui qui n'avait jamais vu la mer (The Boy Who Had Never Seen the Sea)
• Lullaby
• Les Géants (The Giants)
• Voyage au pays des arbres
• Villa Aurore ; suivi de, Orlamonde
• Villa Aurore
• L'enfant de sous le pont
• La Grande Vie suivi de Peuple du ciel
• Peuple du ciel, suivi de 'Les Bergers
• Balaabilou

[edit] Awards and honours

[edit] Awards

Year	Prize	Work
1963	prix Théophraste-Renaudot	Le Procès-Verbal (The Interrogation)
1972	prix littéraire Valery-Larbaud	For his complete works[18]
1980	grand prix de littérature Paul-Morand, awarded by the Académie française
1997	Mécénat des prix Jean Giono[19]	Poisson d'or
1998	prix Prince-de-Monaco	For his complete works and upon publication of Poisson d'or [20]
2008	Stig Dagermanpriset	for his complete works and upon publication of Swedish translation of a travelogue Raga. Approche du continent invisible[21]
2008	Nobel Prize in Literature

[edit] Honours

• He was made Chevalier (Knight) of the Légion d'honneur on 25 October 1991^[22] and was promoted to Officier (Officer) in 2009 ^[23]
• In 1996, he was made Officier (Officer) of the Ordre national du Mérite.^[24]

[edit] References

[edit] External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Jean-Marie Gustave Le Clézio

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: fr:Jean-Marie Gustave Le Clézio

• Works by or about J. M. G. Le Clézio in libraries (WorldCat catalog)
• J.M.G. Le Clézio (1940-), Biography, from `Books and Writers`.
• Interview with Jean-Marie Gustave Le Clézio, in Label France No. 45 (English)
• J.M.G Le Clézio -- Photos by Mathieu Bourgois.
• J.M.G. Le Clézio, about his Breton origins.
• "Nobel Goes Global With Literary Prize", by Bob Thompson, Washington Post, October 10, 2008
• "A Nobel Undertaking: Getting to Know Le Clézio ", by Richard Woodward, Wall Street Journal, Oct. 30, 2008
• "J. M. G. Le Clézio, Nobel laureate": a collection of pieces on Clézio, from TLS, October 9 2008

v • d • e Works by J. M. G. Le Clézio Novels  • Le Procès-Verbal(The Interrogation)  • Le Jour où Beaumont fit connaissance avec sa douleur  • Le Livre des fuites(The Book of Flights: An Adventure Story)  • Le déluge (The Flood)  • Terra Amata(Terra Amata)  • La Guerre(War)  • Voyages de l'autre côté  • Désert (Desert)  • Le Chercheur d'or(The prospector)  • Étoile errante (Wandering Star : a Novel)  • Onitsha(Onitsha)  • La Quarantaine  • Poisson d'or  • Hasard suivi de Angoli Mala  • Fantômes dans la rue  • Révolutions  • Ourania  • Ritournelle de la faim Essays Le Rêve mexicain ou la pensée interrompue (The Mexican Dream, Or, The Interrupted Thought of Amerindian Civilizations)  • Conversations avec J.M.G. Le Clézio  • Haï (essay)  • Sur Lautréamont  • Mydriase  • Vers les icebergs (Essai sur Henri Michaux)  • L'Inconnu sur la Terre  • Trois Villes saintes  • Dans la maison d'Edith  • Diego et Frida  • Ailleurs  • Enfances  • "El Llano en Llamas" trans. Fr.: "Le Llano en flammes"(Preface to the French language edition)  • L'Extase matérielle  • The African (short story)  • Une lettre de J.M.G. Le Clezio  • Ballaciner  • Freedom to Dream and Freedom to Speak  • On reading as true travel  • Dans la forêt des paradoxes (In the forest of paradoxes)  • In the Eye of the Sun: Mexican Fiestas Short Stories La Fièvre (Fever)  • Mondo et autres histoires  • La ronde et autres faits divers (The Round & Other Cold Hard Facts )  • Printemps et autres saisons  • Awaité Pawana (Pawana)  • La Fête chantée et autres essais de thème amérindien  • Cœur brûle et autres romances  • Tabataba suivi de pawana Travel Diaries Voyage à Rodrigues  • Gens des nuages  • Raga. Approche du continent invisible Collections of works translated by the author into French Les Prophéties du Chilam Balam  • Relation de Michoacan  • Sirandanes Books for Children  • Les Géants (The Giants)  • Lullaby  • La Grande Vie (the Great Life)  • La Grande Vie suivi de Peuple du ciel  • Peuple du ciel, suivi de 'Les Bergers  • Balaabilou  • Villa Aurore  • Villa Aurore ; suivi de, Orlamonde  • L'enfant de sous le pont  • Celui qui n'avait jamais vu la mer(The Boy Who Had Never Seen the Sea)  • La Montagne ou le dieu vivant  • Voyage au pays des arbres

v • d • e Nobel Laureates in Literature V. S. Naipaul (2001) · Imre Kertész (2002) · J. M. Coetzee (2003) · Elfriede Jelinek (2004) · Harold Pinter (2005) · Orhan Pamuk (2006) · Doris Lessing (2007) · Jean-Marie Gustave Le Clézio (2008) Complete roster · 1901–1925 · 1926–1950 · 1951–1975 · 1976–2000 · 2001–present

Persondata
NAME	Le Clézio, Jean-Marie Gustave
ALTERNATIVE NAMES	J. M. G. Le Clézio
SHORT DESCRIPTION	Nobel Prize in Literature 2008
DATE OF BIRTH	13 April 1940
PLACE OF BIRTH	Nice, France
DATE OF DEATH
PLACE OF DEATH