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Chamfort
French
- GenresFrance
Paperback
First published January 1, 1988
About the author
Claude Arnaud
37 books2 followersClaude Arnaud (born 1955) is a French writer, essayist, biographer. He won the 2006 Prix Femina Essai.
He worked as an offset printing activist, and participated with the Workers' Struggle.
From 1977–83 he worked in "Film" monthly, led by Jacques Fieschi. He studied literature at the University of Vincennes. He wrote a play about "the redemptive powers of love," with Bernard Minoret, "Les salons" ("Trade shows"). In 1988, he published a biography of Nicolas Chamfort.
(from Wikipedia)
Romancier (Le caméléon, 1994, prix Femina du premier roman, et Le jeu des quatre coins, 1998, chez Grasset), biographe (Chamfort, Robert Laffont, 1988, prix Léautaud, prix Fénéon, prix de l'Essai de l'Académie française), Claude Arnaud a travaillé aussi pour le cinéma et le théâtre. Il est critique littéraire au Point.
He worked as an offset printing activist, and participated with the Workers' Struggle.
From 1977–83 he worked in "Film" monthly, led by Jacques Fieschi. He studied literature at the University of Vincennes. He wrote a play about "the redemptive powers of love," with Bernard Minoret, "Les salons" ("Trade shows"). In 1988, he published a biography of Nicolas Chamfort.
(from Wikipedia)
Romancier (Le caméléon, 1994, prix Femina du premier roman, et Le jeu des quatre coins, 1998, chez Grasset), biographe (Chamfort, Robert Laffont, 1988, prix Léautaud, prix Fénéon, prix de l'Essai de l'Académie française), Claude Arnaud a travaillé aussi pour le cinéma et le théâtre. Il est critique littéraire au Point.
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Displaying 1 of 1 review
November 7, 2016
You may gasp as did I when the sensitive activist Marie-Jeanne Roland, age 38, caught in the convulsive French Revolution, is sent to the guillotine during the Reign of Terror, 1793. France was battling an insane civil war ; you could be denounced by an exlover or your concierge. Mme Roland's last words : "O, liberty! What crimes are committed in your name!"
Chamfort, a writer and activist himself, learning that Roland's husband had taken poison, decided to owe his death to no one but himself. "The Revolution is a lost dog that no one dares collar," he lamented, and pulled the trigger in 1794. (The blood-bath was even worse outside Paris).
After Chamfort's death, loyal friends found and pieced together hundreds of his maxims, anecdotes and aphorisms that reveal a fascinating personality and "man of letters" who was studied by Nietzsche and Schopenhauer. Cocteau said his words could have been written yesterday.
Who was Chamfort ?
His life has a wobbly start as the bastard of an aristo married woman and a cleric ; he is brought up by peasants. Striking and loaded with charm, he steps into a Mozartian chamber work. Fleeing a career in the Church, he says: "I am not fond of hypocrisy and money." His looks and conversational gifts are intros to rich men and women at a time when "literary" salons blazed with worldliness and writers were celebrities. (He was dashing off essays, poems, plays). Couples no longer slept together, says the author, "they slept around together." (I luvit) -- Chamfort reflected : "Love, as it exists in society, is merely an exchange of whims and the contact of skins." By age 25, he caught the pox, which is detailed in W.S. Merwin's work, "Products of the Perfected Civilization."
From high to low, Versailles to garret (for he never had any money), Chamfort delighted courtesans and philosophers. He had an astounding curiousity, which always makes one a cynic. Chamfort moved in worlds where everyone wore a mask -- and played a role. He surely influenced the plays of Anouilh.
An outsider -- a marvelous misfit -- he promoted the Revolution that devoured him. His sharp observation of the human parade -- of things eternal -- gives him contemporary relevance. This bio, packed w names-facts, is not, I advise, a light, "entertaining" read; it's a chunk of skillfully writ French History.
Chamfort: "Give and take pleasure without doing harm to yourself or anyone else -- that, I think, sums up morality."
Chamfort, a writer and activist himself, learning that Roland's husband had taken poison, decided to owe his death to no one but himself. "The Revolution is a lost dog that no one dares collar," he lamented, and pulled the trigger in 1794. (The blood-bath was even worse outside Paris).
After Chamfort's death, loyal friends found and pieced together hundreds of his maxims, anecdotes and aphorisms that reveal a fascinating personality and "man of letters" who was studied by Nietzsche and Schopenhauer. Cocteau said his words could have been written yesterday.
Who was Chamfort ?
His life has a wobbly start as the bastard of an aristo married woman and a cleric ; he is brought up by peasants. Striking and loaded with charm, he steps into a Mozartian chamber work. Fleeing a career in the Church, he says: "I am not fond of hypocrisy and money." His looks and conversational gifts are intros to rich men and women at a time when "literary" salons blazed with worldliness and writers were celebrities. (He was dashing off essays, poems, plays). Couples no longer slept together, says the author, "they slept around together." (I luvit) -- Chamfort reflected : "Love, as it exists in society, is merely an exchange of whims and the contact of skins." By age 25, he caught the pox, which is detailed in W.S. Merwin's work, "Products of the Perfected Civilization."
From high to low, Versailles to garret (for he never had any money), Chamfort delighted courtesans and philosophers. He had an astounding curiousity, which always makes one a cynic. Chamfort moved in worlds where everyone wore a mask -- and played a role. He surely influenced the plays of Anouilh.
An outsider -- a marvelous misfit -- he promoted the Revolution that devoured him. His sharp observation of the human parade -- of things eternal -- gives him contemporary relevance. This bio, packed w names-facts, is not, I advise, a light, "entertaining" read; it's a chunk of skillfully writ French History.
Chamfort: "Give and take pleasure without doing harm to yourself or anyone else -- that, I think, sums up morality."
Displaying 1 of 1 review