Henri Troyat

Troyat, Henri 

(real name Lev Tarasov). Born Nov. 1, 1911, in Moscow. French writer. Member of the Académie Française since 1959.

Troyat was educated in the law and has lived in France since 1918. His first novels were False Light (1935) and The Spider (1938); the latter won him the Goncourt Prize. Troyat is the author of several literary biographies, including Firebrand: The Life of Dostoyevsky (1940), Pushkin (1946), and Tolstoy (1965). He wrote several cycles of historical novels recalling the revolutionary and patriotic traditions of the Russian people. In The Seed and the Fruit (5 vols., 1953–58) and the trilogy The Eygletières (1965–67; Russian translation, 1969), Troyat analyzed the contemporary French bourgeoisie and portrayed the breakdown of the family and the tragedy of young people in a consumer society. He is also known as a writer of novellas, which have appeared in the collections Common Grave (1939) and Eve’s Gesture (1964). Troyat’s plays include The Living (1946) and Sébastien (1949).

WORKS

Gogol. Paris [1971].
Le Carnet vert et autres nouvelles. Moscow, 1974.
In Russian translation:
“Sneg v traure.” Moskva, 1965, no. 9.
“Anna Predail’.” Inostrannaia literatura, 1975, no. 8.

REFERENCE

Gannes, G. “Henri Troyat.” In his book Messieurs les best-sellers. Paris [1966].