Jean Pélégri

Jean Pélégri
Born	(1920-06-20)20 June 1920 Paris, France
Occupation(s)	Author, Professor
Signature

Jean Pélégri (20 June 1920 – 24 September 2003) was a writer and professor of literature. Of French descent, he was born in

He was a friend of many Algerian writers (such as Mohammed Dib and Kateb Yacine) and, like Jean Sénac, Pélégri considered himself to be one of them; he always saw himself as an "Algerian at heart". He supplemented his novels' prefaces with artwork from his painter friends Baya, Abdallah Benanteur, Mohammed Khadda and Jean de Maisonseul. Pélégri also assisted on the film adaptation of his novel Les Oliviers de la justice as screenwriter, dialogue writer and actor. The movie won the Cinema and Television Writers Award at the 1962 Cannes Film Festival.

Reviews

"Jean Pélégri, Algerian by birth and one of the great writers of our time, greater than Albert Camus in any case, remains unknown in France. Why? Because he tried so hard to mark his territory as an Algerian that he created a different kind of French language just for his own use. And for that, French readers rejected him."

Mohammed Dib, Simorgh,

Albin Michel

, Paris, 2003 [his last book].

"No French writer from Algeria, the '

• L'Embarquement du lundi, Éditions Gallimard, 1952.
• Les Oliviers de la justice, Gallimard, 1959. Grand prix catholique de littérature 1960
• Le Maboul, Gallimard, 1963.
• L'Homme-caillou, Abdallah Benanteur, 1965.
• Les Monuments du déluge, Christian Bourgois, 1967.
• Slimane (pièce en quatre actes), Christian Bourgois, 1968.
• L'Homme mangé par la ville (radio drama), France Culture, 1970.
• Le Cheval dans la ville, Gallimard, 1972.
• Le Maître du Tambour (play), Théâtre Jean Vilar, Suresnes, 1974.
• Ma mère, l'Algérie, Laphomic,
  ISBN 286869554X
  ).
• Les Étés perdus,
  ISBN 2020367580
  ).

• Jean Pélégri, in Algérie Littérature/Action n° 29, Editions Marsa, March 1999.
• Dominique Le Boucher, Jean Pélégri l'Algérien ou Le scribe du caillou, with unpublished texts by Jean Pélégri, two volumes, Algérie Littérature/Action n°37-38, Editions Marsa, 2000 (
  ISBN 2913868118
  ).
• Dominique Le Boucher, Les deux Jean; Jean Sénac, l'homme soleil, Jean Pélégri, l'homme caillou (correspondence 1962-1973, poèmes inédits), Montpellier, Chèvre-feuille étoilée, et Alger, Barzakh, 2002 (
  ISBN 2914467052
  ).