Raymond Radiguet
Raymond Radiguet | |
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Le bal du Comte d'Orgel | |
Partner | Jean Cocteau (1919–1923) |
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Raymond Radiguet (18 June 1903 – 12 December 1923) was a
Early life
Radiguet was born in
Career
In early 1923, Radiguet published his first and most famous novel, Le Diable au corps (The Devil in the Flesh). The story of a young married woman who has an affair with a 16-year-old boy while her husband is away fighting at the front provoked scandal in a country that had just been through World War I.[3] Though Radiguet denied it, it was established later that the story was in large part autobiographical.[3]
His second novel,
In addition to his two novels, Radiguet's works include a few poetry volumes and a play.[2]
Associations
He associated himself with the
Literary reactions
In 1945, Steadman and Blake write that admirers of his first novel "include the most discriminating of critics." Aldous Huxley is quoted as declaring that Radiguet had attained the literary control that others required a long career to reach. François Mauriac said that Le Diable au corps is "unretouched and seems shocking, but nothing so resembles cynicism as clairvoyance. No adolescent before Radiguet has delivered to us the secret of that age: we have all falsified it."[7]
Death
On 12 December 1923, Radiguet died at age 20 in Paris of typhoid fever, which he contracted after a trip he took with Cocteau. Cocteau, in an interview with The Paris Review, stated that Radiguet had told him three days before his death that, "In three days, I am going to be shot by the soldiers of God."[8] In reaction to this death Francis Poulenc wrote, "For two days I was unable to do anything, I was so stunned".[9]
In her 1932 memoir, Laughing Torso, British artist Nina Hamnett describes Radiguet's funeral: "The church was crowded with people. In the pew in front of us was the negro band from
25 février 1924
CHERE NINA
Je suis toujours malade et sans courage.
Telephonez un matin.
De coeur,
JEAN COCTEAUEnglish Translation
25 February 1924
DEAR NINA
I am still sick and without courage.
Call me in the morning.
With heart,
JEAN COCTEAU"
Bibliography
- Les Joues en feu (1920) – poetry, translated by Alan Stone as Cheeks on Fire: Collected Poems
- Devoirs de vacances (1921) – poetry (English translation Holiday Homework)
- Les Pelican (1921) – drama, translated by Michael Benedikt and George Wellworth as The Pelicans
- Le Diable au corps (1923) – novel, translated by Kay Boyle as The Devil in the Flesh
- Le Bal du comte d'Orgel (1924) – novel, translated by Malcolm Cowley as The Count's Ball
- Oeuvres completes (1952) – translated as Complete Works
- Regle du jeu (1957) – translated as Game Rule
- Vers Libres & Jeux Innocents, Le Livre a Venir (1988) – translated as About Free & Games Innocents, The Book is Coming[1]
Film adaptations
In 1947,
In 1970, Le Bal du compte d'Orgel was adapted into a film, starring Jean-Claude Brialy as Le comte Anne d'Orgel. It was the last movie directed by Marc Allégret, who, like Radiguet, had once fallen under the spell of Cocteau.
In popular culture
The artist David Cilnius has dedicated his lyric/poem Whip the poor will to the writer's premature death, quoting Radiguet's last words.[11]
References
- ^ a b Di Stefano, Loïc (6 November 2012). "Raymond Radiguet : Biographie". salon-litteraire.linternaute.com/fr. Retrieved 7 December 2016.
- ^ a b "Raymond Radiguet | French author". Encyclopædia Britannica. Retrieved 7 December 2016.
- ^ a b "THE DEVIL IN THE FLESH | A NOVEL RAYMOND RADIGUET | TRANSLATED BY CHRISTOPHER MONCRIEFF | PART OF THE NEVERSINK LIBRARY". mhpbooks.com. Melville House Publishing. Retrieved 7 December 2016.
- ^ "LibrAdventures – June 1919: Jean Cocteau meets Raymond Radiguet". libradventures.com. LibrAdventures | Literary Atlas. 15 August 2014. Retrieved 7 December 2016.
- ^ Thurston, Michael: "Genre, Gender, and Truth in Death in the Afternoon," The Hemingway Review, Spring 1998
- ^ Ernest Hemingway, Death in the Afternoon, p.71
- ^ Steadman, Christina and Blake, William: Modern Women in Love, Garden City Publishing Co., New York, 1947 (first ed. Dryden Press, New York City, 1945) p. 3
- ^ Fifield, Interviewed by William (7 October 1964). "Jean Cocteau, The Art of Fiction No. 34". The Paris Review. Summer-Fall 1964 (32, SUMMER-FALL 1964). Retrieved 7 December 2016.
- ^ (Ivry 1996)
- ^ Canby, Vincent (29 May 1987). "Movie Review – Devil in the Flesh". Movies.NYTimes.com. Retrieved 1 March 2011.
- ^ Cilnius, David (25 May 2021). ""Whip the poor will"". Instagram. Archived from the original on 24 December 2021.
Further reading
- ISBN 0-7148-3503-X
- Steadman, Christina and Blake, William: Modern Women in Love, Garden City Publishing Co., New York, 1947 (first ed. Dryden Press, New York City, 1945) p. 3
External links
- Quotations related to Raymond Radiguet at Wikiquote