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{{Short description|French writer (1910-2007)}}
{{Multiple issues|
{{expand French|topic=bio|Julien Gracq|date=December 2017}}
{{more footnotes needed|date=December 2017}}
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{{Infobox writer 
| name = Julien Gracq
| image = Julien_Gracq_(1951)_(cropped).jpg
| image_size =
| caption = Gracq in 1951
| pen_name =
| birth_name = Louis Poirier
| birth_date = {{birth date|df=yes|1910|7|27}}
| birth_place = [[Saint-Florent-le-Vieil]], [[Maine-et-Loire]], France
| death_date = {{death date and age|df=yes|2007|12|22|1910|7|27}}
| death_place = [[Angers]], France
| occupation = Novelist, critic, playwright, poet
| period = 1938–2002
| education = [[University of Paris]]
| genre =
| subject =
| movement =
| influences =
| influenced =
| signature = Signature julien gracq.png
| website =
| footnotes =
}}

'''Julien Gracq''' ({{IPA|fr|gʁak|lang}}; born '''Louis Poirier'''; 27 July 1910 – 22 December 2007) was a French writer.<ref name=NYTobit>{{cite news |title=Julien Gracq, 97, Iconoclastic French Surrealist Writer|newspaper=[[The New York Times]]|date=24 December 2007}}</ref> He wrote novels, critiques, a play, and poetry. His literary works were noted for their dreamlike abstraction, elegant style and refined vocabulary. He was close to the [[Surrealism|surrealist movement]], in particular its leader [[André Breton]].<ref name=NYTobit />

==Life==
Gracq first studied in Paris at the ''[[Lycée Henri IV]]'', where he earned his [[baccalauréat]]. He then entered the [[École Normale Supérieure]] in 1930, later studying at the ''[[Paris Institute of Political Studies|École libre des sciences politiques]]'' (Sciences Po.), both schools of the [[University of Paris]] at the time.

In 1932, he read [[André Breton]]'s ''[[Nadja (novel)|Nadja]]'', which deeply influenced him. His first novel, ''[[The Castle of Argol]]'', is dedicated to that surrealist writer, to whom he devoted a whole book in 1948.

In 1936, he joined the [[French Communist Party]] but quit the party in 1939 after the [[Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact]] was signed.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Bowd |first1=Gavin |title=The Political Landscapes of Julien Gracq |journal=Dalhousie French Studies |date=Summer 2004 |volume=67 |pages=121–133}}</ref>

During the Second World War, he was a prisoner of war in Silesia with other officers of the French Army. One of the friendships he formed there was with author and literary critic Armand Hoog, who later described Gracq as a passionate individualist and ferociously anti-[[Vichy France|Vichy]].<ref>Bernhild Boie, « Chronologie », in Julien Gracq, ''Œuvres I'', Paris, Gallimard, Bibliothèque de la Pléiade, p. LXI.</ref>

In 1950, he published a fierce attack on contemporary literary culture and literary prizes in the review ''Empédocle'' titled ''[[La Littérature à l'estomac]]''. When he won the ''[[Prix Goncourt]]'' for ''[[The Opposing Shore]]'' (''Le Rivage des Syrtes'') the following year, he remained consistent with his criticism and refused the prize.<ref name=NYTobit />

Gracq taught history and geography in secondary school (high school) until he retired in 1970.

In 1979, he wrote the foreword to a re-edition of the ''Journal de l'analogiste'' (1954) by [[Suzanne Lilar]], a work he called a "sumptuous initiation to poetry" (''"une initiation somptueuse à la poésie"'').

In 1989, Gracq's work was published by the ''[[Bibliothèque de la Pléiade]]''. He remained distant from major literary events and faithful to his first publisher, [[José Corti]].

Gracq lived a quiet life in his native town of Saint-Florent-le-Vieil, on the banks of the river [[Loire]]. On 22 December 2007, a couple of days after suffering a dizzy spell, he died at the age of 97 in a hospital in [[Angers]].

Gracq left notebooks with about 3500 pages of unpublished material. He expressed a wish that none of it should be published until at least 20 years after his death.<ref>{{cite news |last=Solym |first=Clément |date=14 August 2014 |url=https://actualitte.com/article/47501/archives/les-terres-au-couchant-un-inedit-1956-de-julien-gracq-pour-octobre |title=Les Terres au couchant, un inédit (1956) de Julien Gracq pour octobre |newspaper=ActuaLitté |language=fr |access-date=22 January 2026 }}</ref> His novel ''[[The Sunset Lands]]'', which he worked on from 1953 to 1956 but abandoned, was published in 2014.<ref>{{cite news |last=Sulser |first=Eléonore |date=3 October 2014 |url=https://www.letemps.ch/culture/livres/retrouvez-julien-gracq-terres-couchant |title=Retrouvez Julien Gracq dans 'Les Terres du couchant' |newspaper=[[Le Temps]] |language=de |access-date=22 January 2026 }}</ref>

==''The Opposing Shore''==
{{Main|The Opposing Shore}}
''The Opposing Shore'' (''Le Rivage des Syrtes'', 1951) is Julien Gracq's most famous novel.

A novel of waiting, it is set in an old fortress close to a sea which defines the ancestral border between the stagnant principality of Orsenna and the territory of its archenemy, the mysterious Farghestan. Its lonely characters are caught in a no man's land, waiting for something to happen and wondering whether something should be done to bring about change, particularly when change may mean the death of civilisations.

==Works==
*''Au château d'Argol'', 1938 (novel). ''[[The Castle of Argol]]''
*''Un beau ténébreux'', 1945 (novel). ''[[A Dark Stranger]]''
*''Liberté grande'', 1946 (poetry)''. Great Liberty''
*''Le Roi pêcheur'', 1948 (play)
*''André Breton, quelques aspects de l'écrivain'', 1948 (critique)
*''La Littérature à l'estomac'', 1949
*''Le Rivage des Syrtes'', 1951 (novel). ''[[The Opposing Shore]]''
*''Prose pour l'Étrangère'', 1952
*''Penthésilée'', 1954 (play; translation of Kleist's ''Penthesilea'')
*''Un balcon en forêt'', 1958 (novel). ''[[Balcony in the Forest]]''
*''Préférences'', 1961
*''Lettrines'', 1967
*''[[La Presqu'île]]'', 1970
*''Le Roi Cophetua'', 1970 (novel)''. King Cophetua''; it inspired the film ''[[Rendezvous at Bray]]'', directed by [[André Delvaux]]
*''Lettrines II'', 1974
*''Les Eaux Étroites'', 1976. ''[[The Narrow Waters]]''; allusions, allegories and metaphors on a French river, l'[[Èvre]]
*''En lisant en écrivant'', 1980. ''[[Reading Writing]]''
*''La Forme d'une ville'', 1985. ''[[The Shape of a City]]''
*''Autour des sept collines'', 1988
*''Carnets du grand chemin'', 1992
*''Entretiens'', 2002
*''Les Terres du couchant'', 2014 (novel). ''[[The Sunset Lands]]''

==See also==
*[[Le Monde's 100 Books of the Century|''Le Monde''{{'}}s 100 Books of the Century]], a list which includes ''The Opposing Shore''

==References==
<References />
*[[Jean-Louis de Rambures]], "Comment travaillent les écrivains", Paris 1978 (interview with J. Gracq)
* [http://www.gerard-bertrand.net/index_rencontres_gracq.html Encounters with Julien Gracq"], by Gérard Bertrand
* Dominique Perrin, "De Louis Poirier à Julien Gracq", Paris, Classiques Garnier, 2009, 759 p.

==External links==
{{Wikinews|French writer Julien Gracq dies at 97}}
* [http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/obituaries/article3110849.ece Obituary in ''The Times'', 31 December 2007]{{dead link|date=January 2025|bot=medic}}{{cbignore|bot=medic}}

{{Prix Goncourt}}
{{America Award in Literature}}
{{Portal bar|Biography}}

{{Authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Gracq, Julien}}
[[Category:1910 births]]
[[Category:2007 deaths]]
[[Category:People from Maine-et-Loire]]
[[Category:20th-century French novelists]]
[[Category:21st-century French novelists]]
[[Category:French fantasy writers]]
[[Category:Writers from Pays de la Loire]]
[[Category:Sciences Po alumni]]
[[Category:École normale supérieure (Paris) alumni]]
[[Category:Lycée Henri-IV alumni]]
[[Category:Prix Goncourt winners]]
[[Category:20th-century French male novelists]]
[[Category:21st-century French male novelists]]

Julien Gracq - Revision history

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