Jean Anouilh facts for kids
Quick facts for kids
Jean Anouilh
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Anouilh c. 1953
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| Born | Jean Marie Lucien Pierre Anouilh 23 June 1910 Bordeaux, France |
| Died | 3 October 1987 (aged 77) Lausanne, Switzerland |
| Occupation | Dramatist and screenwriter |
| Literary movement | Modernism |
| Notable works | The Lark Becket Traveler without Luggage Antigone |
| Notable awards | Prix mondial Cino Del Duca |
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Jean Anouilh (born June 23, 1910 – died October 3, 1987) was a famous French dramatist and screenwriter. He wrote plays for over 50 years! His plays covered many different styles, from serious dramas to funny, silly comedies.
Anouilh is most famous for his 1944 play Antigone. This play was based on an old Greek story by Sophocles. Many people saw it as a hidden message against the French government during World War II. Anouilh's plays were known for having clear stories and clever conversations. He was one of France's most active writers after the war. A big theme in his work was about staying true to yourself in a world where people often give in to what's easy or popular.
Contents
Life and Career
Growing Up and Starting Out
Jean Anouilh was born in Cérisole, a small village near Bordeaux, France. His family had Basque roots. His father, François Anouilh, was a tailor. Jean believed he learned to be careful and proud of his work from his dad. His artistic side might have come from his mother, Marie-Magdeleine. She was a violinist who played in a casino orchestra to help the family earn money.
Marie-Magdeleine often worked night shifts in music halls. This gave young Jean many chances to watch plays from backstage. He would often go to rehearsals and ask writers if he could read their scripts. He even tried writing his own plays at age 12, but those early works are now lost.
In 1918, his family moved to Paris. Jean went to high school at the Lycée Chaptal. A famous French director named Jean-Louis Barrault was also a student there. He remembered Anouilh as a serious and stylish boy. Jean got into law school at the Sorbonne. But he couldn't afford to stay, so he left after 18 months. He then found a job writing ads at an advertising agency. He actually liked this work! He said it taught him to be clear and precise with his words.
Jean's money problems continued when he joined the military in 1929. With only a small soldier's salary, he married actress Monelle Valentin in 1931. Monelle starred in many of his plays. Jean and Monelle had a daughter named Catherine in 1934. Catherine also became involved in theatre from a young age.
Working in Theatre
When he was 25, Anouilh became a secretary for the French actor and director Louis Jouvet. Jouvet worked at a theatre called Comédie des Champs-Elysées. Jouvet wasn't very interested in helping Anouilh write plays. However, Jouvet was famous for working with another playwright, Jean Giraudoux. Together, they helped bring the focus back to the playwright's words, instead of just the director's ideas.
Giraudoux inspired Anouilh. With Giraudoux's encouragement, Anouilh started writing again in 1929. Later that year, his first play, Humulus le muet, was performed. He wrote it with Jean Aurenche. This was followed by his first plays written alone: L'Hermine (The Ermine) in 1932 and Mandarine in 1933. Both were produced by Aurélien Lugné-Poe, a creative actor and stage manager. Lugné-Poe believed "the word creates the decor." This meant Anouilh's beautiful writing could shine with simple sets.
These early plays weren't huge hits. But Anouilh kept going, writing many more. A notable one was Y'avait un prisonnier (1935). He often worked with the experimental Russian director Georges Pitoëff. Even though their plays didn't make a lot of money at first, they were seen as promising. Their first big success came in 1937 with Le voyageur sans bagage (Traveller Without Luggage). After this, there was almost always a new Anouilh play in Paris each season. Many of his plays were also performed in England and America. After 1938, André Barsacq, a famous set designer, directed many of Anouilh's plays. Barsacq was a big supporter of Anouilh, which helped the playwright stay successful after the war.
Becoming a Famous Playwright
In the 1940s, Anouilh started writing plays about myths, classic stories, and historical events. His main characters often tried to be independent from their past. Themes in his plays during this time were similar to those of writers like Jean-Paul Sartre and Albert Camus.
His most famous play from this time was Antigone. This play made Anouilh a leading playwright. It showed a strong conflict between Antigone, who wouldn't compromise, and Creon, who was practical about politics. French theatre-goers during the war saw the play as a political story about their own time. After the war, his plays continued with similar ideas. These included Roméo et Jeannette, Médée (Medea), and his Joan of Arc story L'Alouette (The Lark). The Lark was more hopeful and was as successful as Antigone.
Anouilh grouped his plays by their main mood. He published them in collections to show how his writing changed. He called his tragedies or realistic dramas Pièces noires ("Black plays"). These included Antigone, Jézabel, and La Sauvage (The Restless Heart). In these plays, young, idealist characters often chose death to keep their honesty.
In contrast, Anouilh's pièces roses ("pink plays") were comedies. They were often like fairy tales. Plays like Le Bal des voleurs (Carnival of Thieves), Le Rendez-vous de Senlis (Dinner with the Family), and Léocadia (Time Remembered) focused on characters trying to find a happier, freer life away from the past.
Many of Anouilh's plays from the late 1940s and 1950s became darker and more serious. Unlike his earlier works, these plays often featured middle-aged characters who had to be more practical about life. He divided these works into pièces brillantes ("brilliant plays") and pièces grinçantes ("grating plays"). The "brilliant plays," like L'Invitation au château (Ring Round the Moon) and Colombe, had fancy settings and clever conversations. The "grating plays," like La Valse des toréadors (Waltz of the Toreadors) and Le Réactionnaire amoureux (The Fighting Cock), were more bitterly funny and showed disappointment.
Another group Anouilh named were his pièces costumées ("costume plays"). These included The Lark, La Foire d'Empoigne (Catch as Catch Can), and Becket. Becket was a huge international hit. It told the story of Thomas Becket, an archbishop who stood up to his friend, Henry II of England, the king. Anouilh said these plays had historical "costumed" settings and featured a main character trying to find a moral path in a world full of dishonesty.
Anouilh's last period of plays began with La Grotte (The Cavern). In this play, he thought about his own journey as a writer. The main character is a playwright who can't write, and he thinks about other plays where characters come to life. Anouilh's plays had always hinted at being about theatre itself. But in his later works, this became more clear. He started writing mostly about characters who were playwrights or theatre directors. During this time, he also linked theatre and family relationships. He showed that close family ties were more important than big, dramatic theatre actions. Scholars have called his latest works pièces secrètes (secret dramas).
Awards and Recognition
In 1970, Jean Anouilh received the Prix mondial Cino Del Duca award for his work. In 2012, it was revealed that Anouilh was considered for the 1962 Nobel Prize in Literature. He was on a shortlist with other famous writers like John Steinbeck (who won that year). It's not clear why Anouilh didn't win, but another French poet had won in 1960.
In 1980, Anouilh was the very first person to receive the Grand Prix du Théâtre de l'Académie française.
Later Years and Legacy
Jean Anouilh kept writing and publishing plays for over 50 years. His early plays were sometimes seen as "realistic studies of a dirty and corrupt world." But Anouilh disagreed with these serious interpretations. He believed his plays, like great French literature, found ways to laugh at bad luck. He said, "Thanks to Molière, the true French theatre is the only one that is not gloomy, in which we laugh like men at war with our misery and our horror. This humor is one of France's messages to the world."
In the 1950s, Anouilh explored his feelings about General de Gaulle in plays like L'Hurluberlu, ou Le Reactionnaire amoureux (1958). However, he started to lose popularity with audiences and critics. This was because new playwrights like Eugène Ionesco and Samuel Beckett became famous. While Anouilh shared a similar sad view of human life with these writers, their new "absurdist" plays made Anouilh's more realistic plays seem old-fashioned. In the 1980s, Anouilh became a director, staging his own plays and others. He passed away from a heart attack in Lausanne, Switzerland, on October 3, 1987.
Key Plays
Here are some of Jean Anouilh's most famous plays:
- Le Voyageur sans bagage (Traveller Without Luggage) (1937)
- Antigone (1944)
- L'Invitation au château (Ring Round the Moon) (1947)
- Colombe (1951)
- La Valse des toréadors (Waltz of the Toreadors) (1952)
- L'Alouette (The Lark) (1952)
- Becket ou l'Honneur de Dieu (Becket) (1959)
Images for kids
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The grave of Anouilh, his eldest daughter Catherine (1934-1989) and his last partner Ursula Wetzel (1938-2010) at the cemetery of Pully near Lausanne.
See also
In Spanish: Jean Anouilh para niños
