Biographies of authors

Biographical Notes for EE. Schmitt

Born in 1960, he attended the prestigious Ecole Normale Supérieure where he was awarded a doctorate in Philosophy and the top French teaching qualification. Schmitt first made a name for himself in the theatre with The Visitor, a play that posits a meeting between Freud and possibly God; the work soon became a classic and is now part of international repertoire. Further successes quickly followed, including Enigma Variations, The Libertine, Between Worlds, Partners in Crime, My Gospels and Sentimental Tectonics. Acclaimed by audiences and critics alike, his plays have won several Molières and the French Academy Grand Prix du Théâtre.

More recently, the four novellas that make up his Cycle de l'Invisible, a series of tales dealing with childhood and spirituality, have met with huge success both on stage and in the bookshops. These are Milarepa, Monsieur Ibrahim and the Flowers of the Koran, Oscar and the Lady in Pink, Noah's Child and "Le sumo qui ne pouvait pas grossir". Much of his literary career has been devoted to writing novels. An early novel, The Sect of the Egoists, was followed by novels of light, The Gospel According to Pilate, and shadows, The Alternative Hypothesis. Since then he has written When I was a Work of Art, a whimsical and contemporary version of the Faustus myth and My Life with Mozart, a strikingly original compilation of private correspondence with the Austrian composer. Two collections of short stories followed: Odette Toulemonde and other stories, eight tales about women in search of happiness inspired by his first film, and The Dreamer of Ostend, a wonderful tribute to the power of the imagination.In 2010 his third book of short stories, Concerto in Memory of an Angel, was awarded the prestigious Prix Goncourt de la Nouvelle (short story). Meanwhile, Ulysses from Bagdad, his latest novel, is a picaresque saga for our time that questions the human condition.

A keen music-lover, Eric-Emmanuel Schmitt has also translated into French The Marriage of Figaro and Don Giovanni from the original Italian.

His fertile imagination continues to open new doors and cast unusual reflections. Odette Toulemonde, the first motion picture he wrote and directed has been running on European screens in 2007.

Eric-Emmanuel Schmitt lives in Brussels. Within a decade, Eric-Emmanuel Schmitt has become one of the most read and acted French-language authors in the world. His books have been translated into 43 languages, and more than 50 countries regularly perform his plays.

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Biographical Notes for F. Guene

Faiza Guene is the author of Just Like Tomorrow (aka Kiffe Kiffe Demain published in her native France while Faiza was still a teenager). Her parents were Algerian immigrants to France, and Faiza grew up in the public housing projects in Pantin, just outside Paris (Les Courtillieres).
When she was 13, she began attending the neighbourhood cultural centre, which offered film, theatre, and writing workshops. One of the founders of the centre read the first 40 pages of the novel, and showed it to his sister, who works for French publishers Hatchette. Over 100,000 copies of the novel have been sold in France.
Faiza studies at the University of St. Denis. Faiza Guene recently completed a short film entitled Rien Que Des Mots, although she completed her first film,"La Zonzoniere" when she was only 14.

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Biographical Notes for A. Gavalda

Anna Gavalda (born 9 December 1970 in Boulogne-Billancourt, Hauts-de-Seine) is a French teacher and award-winning novelist. While working as French teacher in high school, a collection of her short stories was first published in 1999 under the title "Je voudrais que quelqu'un m'attende quelque part" that met with both critical acclaim and commercial success, selling more than three-quarters of a million copies in her native France and winning the 2000 "Grand Prix RTL- Lire." The book was translated into numerous languages including in English and sold in twenty-seven countries. It was published to acclaim in North America in 2003 as "I Wish Someone Were Waiting for Me Somewhere." The book received much praise and is a library and school selection worldwide in several languages.
Gavalda's first novel, Je l'aimais (Someone I Loved) was published in France in February 2002 and later that year in English. Inspired by the failure of her own marriage, it too was a major literary success and a bestseller and was followed by the short juvenile novel 35 kilos d'espoir (95 Pounds of Hope) that she said she wrote "to pay tribute to those of my students who were dunces in school but otherwise fantastic people".
In 2004, her third novel, "Ensemble c'est tout," focused on the lives of four people living in an apartment house: a struggling young artist who works as an office cleaner at night, a young aristocrat misfit, a cook, and an elderly grandmother. The 600-page book is a bestseller in France and has been translated into English as Hunting and Gathering.
As of 2007, her three books have sold more than 3 million copies in France. Ensemble c'est tout was made into a successful movie in 2007 by Claude Berri, with Audrey Tautou and Guillaume Canet. The adaptation of her first novel, Je l'aimais, with Daniel Auteuil and Marie-Jos%uFFFDe Croze, was filmed in 2009 by Zabou Breitman.
A mother of two, Gavalda lives in the city of Melun, Seine-et-Marne, about 50 km southeast of Paris. In addition to writing novels, she also contributes to Elle magazine.

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Biographical Notes for T. Ungerer

Tomi Ungerer was born in Strasbourg in Alsace. His mother Alice moved to Logelbach, near Colmar, after the death of Tomi's father, Theodore, an artist, engineer, and astronomical clock manufacturer, in 1936. Ungerer also lived through the German occupation of Alsace, causing his house to be requisitioned by the army of Nazi Germany. As a young man, Ungerer was inspired by the illustrations appearing in The New Yorker magazine, particularly the work of Saul Steinberg. He was also influenced by fine artists like George Grosz and Paul Klee.) Ungerer moved to the United States in 1956. The following year, Ungerer published his first children's book for Harper & Row, The Mellops Go Flying. He also did illustration work for such publications as The New York Times, Esquire, Life, Harper's Bazaar and The Village Voice. Upon the publication of Ungerer's children's book Moon Man in 1966, Maurice Sendak called it "easily one of the best picture books in recent years. In 1998, Ungerer was awarded the Hans Christian Andersen Award for illustration. In 2007, his hometown dedicated a museum to him, the Musee Tomi Ungerer/Centre international de l'illustration. Ungerer currently divides his time between the Mizen Peninsula, in Ireland (where he and his wife moved in 1976), and Strasbourg. In addition to his work as an illustrator, Ungerer is also a designer, toy collector, and "archivist of human absurdity."

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Biographical Notes for JMG Le Clezio

Jean-Marie Gustave Le Clezio (born 13 April 1940), usually identified as J. M. G. Le Clezio, is a globetrotting French author, professor, and Nobel laureate. The author of over forty works, he was awarded the 1963 Prix Renaudot for his novel Le Proces-Verbal.

Le Clezio was born in Nice, his mother's native city, during World War II when his father was serving in the British army in Nigeria. He was raised in Roquebilliere, a small village near Nice until 1948 when he, his mother, and his brother boarded a ship to join his father in Nigeria. His 1991 novel, Onitsha is partly autobiographical. In a 2004 essay, he reminisced about his childhood in Nigeria and his relationship with his parents.
After studying at the University of Bristol in England from 1958 to 1959, he finished his undergraduate degree at Nice's Institut d'Etudes litt%uFFFDraires. In 1964 Le Clezio earned a master's degree from the University of Provence with a thesis on Henri Michaux. After several years spent in London and Bristol, he moved to the United States to work as a teacher. During 1967 he served in the French military in Thailand, but was quickly expelled from the country for protesting against child prostitution and sent to Mexico to finish his military obligation. From 1970 to 1974, he lived with the Embera-Wounaan tribe in Panama. He has been married since 1975 to Jemia, who is Moroccan, and has three daughters (one by a first marriage). Since the 1990s they have divided their residence between Albuquerque, Mauritius, and Nice.

Le Clezio has been writing since age seven; his first work was a book about the sea. He achieved very early success at age 23 when his first novel Le Proces-Verbal (The Interrogation) earned him the Prix Renaudot and was shortlisted for the Prix Goncourt. Since then he has published more than thirty-six books, including short stories, novels, essays, two translations on the subject of Native American mythology, and several children's books.>

The Nobel Prize in Literature for 2008 went to Le Clezio for works characterized by the Swedish Academy as being "poetic adventure and sensual ecstasy" and for being focused on the environment, especially the desert.

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Biographical Notes for Eric Carle

Eric Carle is acclaimed and beloved as the creator of brilliantly illustrated and innovatively designed picture books for very young children. His best-known work, The Very Hungry Caterpillar, has eaten its way into the hearts of literally millions of children all over the world and has been translated into more than 47 languages and sold over 29 million copies. Since the Caterpillar was published in 1969, Eric Carle has illustrated more than seventy books, many best sellers, most of which he also wrote, and more than 88 million copies of his books have sold around the world.

Born in Syracuse, New York, in 1929, Eric Carle moved with his parents to Germany when he was six years old; he was educated there, and graduated from the prestigious art school, the Akademie der bildenden Künste, in Stuttgart. But his dream was always to return to America, the land of his happiest childhood memories. So, in 1952, with a fine portfolio in hand and forty dollars in his pocket, he arrived in New York. Soon he found a job as a graphic designer in the promotion department of The New York Times. Later, he was the art director of an advertising agency for many years.

One day, respected educator and author, Bill Martin Jr, called to ask Carle to illustrate a story he had written. Martin's eye had been caught by a striking picture of a red lobster that Carle had created for an advertisement. Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See? was the result of their collaboration. It is still a favorite with children everywhere. This was the beginning of Eric Carle's true career. Soon Carle was writing his own stories, too. His first wholly original book was 1,2,3 to the Zoo, followed soon afterward by the celebrated classic, The Very Hungry Caterpillar.

Eric Carle's art is distinctive and instantly recognizable. His art work is created in collage technique, using hand-painted papers, which he cuts and layers to form bright and cheerful images. Many of his books have an added dimension—die-cut pages, twinkling lights as in The Very Lonely Firefly, even the lifelike sound of a cricket's song as in The Very Quiet Cricket - giving them a playful quality: a toy that can be read, a book that can be touched. Children also enjoy working in collage and many send him pictures they have made themselves, inspired by his illustrations. He receives hundreds of letters each week from his young admirers.

The secret of Eric Carle's books; appeal lies in his intuitive understanding of and respect for children, who sense in him instinctively someone who shares their most cherished thoughts and emotions.

The themes of his stories are usually drawn from his extensive knowledge and love of nature; an interest shared by most small children. Besides being beautiful and entertaining, his books always offer the child the opportunity to learn something about the world around them. It is his concern for children, for their feelings and their inquisitiveness, for their creativity and their intellectual growth that, in addition to his beautiful artwork, makes the reading of his books such a stimulating and lasting experience.

Carle says: "With many of my books I attempt to bridge the gap between the home and school. To me home represents, or should represent; warmth, security, toys, holding hands, being held. School is a strange and new place for a child. Will it be a happy place? There are new people, a teacher, classmates;will they be friendly?"

I believe the passage from home to school is the second biggest trauma of childhood; the first is, of course, being born. Indeed, in both cases we leave a place of warmth and protection for one that is unknown. The unknown often brings fear with it. In my books I try to counteract this fear, to replace it with a positive message. I believe that children are naturally creative and eager to learn. I want to show them that learning is really both fascinating and fun."

Eric Carle has two grown-up children, a son and a daughter. With his wife Barbara, he divides his time between the Florida Keys and the hills of North Carolina.

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