Louis Calaferte

Louis Calaferte (14 July 1928 - 2 May 1994) was an Italian-born French naturalized novelist. He was born in Turin, Italy, but emigrated to France with his parents when he was very young, settling in a Lyon suburb where he spent the majority of his childhood and adolescence. In 1947, he set out for Paris to pursue his dream of becoming an actor, where he found a love for writing instead. Over the span of his career, he published a variety of works, including “a fantastic profusion of novels, short stories, essays, plays, poems and erotica of a particularly distinguished vulgarity that created genuine excitement in the most blase connoisseur”. This writing style resulted in a variety of literary prizes, including the Prix de l’Academie Française for Ebauche d’un autoportrait in 1983; for a collection of poems, Londoniennes in 1985; and for a collection of short stories, Promenades dans un parc in 1987. Calaferte died in Dijon, France on 2 May 1994.

In his early teens, Calaferte worked as an errand boy in a battery factory and later began work as a general laborer. During this time, he enjoyed reading books; subsequently, in 1947 he moved to Paris, where he got a job at Odéon - Théâtre de l'Europe (formerly the Théâtre de l’Odéon) as a theatre extra. It was then and there that he wrote his first plays. One of them was performed at a preview performance at Théâtre d'Angers, earning him a standing ovation at the age of twenty.

With the support of his “literary hero” Joseph Kessel, he had Requiem des innocents published by Éditions Julliard in 1952. This work was a culmination of childhood memories in which Calaferte’s rebellious writing style began to emerge. This first book had great success and was soon followed by the publication of Partage des vivants (The Lot of the Living) in 1953. These two youthful works would be severely criticized by the author twenty five years later. He is quoted as saying: “If I had to name two of my books that I loathe, it would be the first two; I would gladly see them disappear”.