Sagan, Françoise

Sagan, Françoise (fräNswäz` sägäN`), pseudonym of Françoise Quoirez (kwärĕz`), 1935–2004, French novelist, b. Françoise Quoirez. She became famous with her precocious first book, Bonjour tristesse (1954, tr. 1955), a bittersweetly amoral portrayal of a sophisticated, disillusioned French society. Her other novels include Un Certain Sourire (tr. 1956), Aimez-vous Brahms? (1959, tr. 1960), and Un Sang d'aquarelle (1987, tr. Painting in Blood, 1988).

Bibliography

See study by J. Miller (1988).

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Sagan, Françoise

 orig. Françoise Quoirez

(born June 21, 1935, Carjac, France—died Sept. 24, 2004, Honfleur) French novelist and dramatist. While attending the Sorbonne, she published her best-known novel, the poignant Bonjour Tristesse (1954), when she was 19 years old. It became an international best-seller and was followed by A Certain Smile (1956). Her later novels often feature aimless people in tangled relationships. Her plays, including Opposite Extremes (1987), resemble her novels in their subject matter.

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Sagan, Françoise 

Born June 21, 1935, in Cajarc, Lot Department. French writer.

Sagan graduated from a Catholic lycée in Paris. Her first novels, Bonjour Tristesse (1954; Russian translation, 1974) and A Certain Smile (1956), expressed the attitude of French youth who had become indifferent to society and its problems. The novels Those Without Shadows (1957), Aimez-vous Brahms? (1959; film version, 1961; Russian translation, 1974), The Wonderful Clouds (1961), La Chamade (1965), and A Few Hours of Sunlight (1969; Russian translation, 1972) depict young girls who on the threshold of womanhood confront an unresolvable problem—the need for love and the impossibility of finding it. Sagan’s prose is noted for its clarity, precision, and subtlety of psychological characterization; however, her novels suffer from narrowness of subject and social outlook, the limited nature of the problems examined, and repetitiveness. Her plays, which include Castle in Sweden (1960), At Times, Violins (1962), and Valentine’s Mauve Dress (1963), are light comedies in the tradition of the théâtre des boulevards.

WORKS

Des Bleus à l’âme. Paris, 1972.
Un Profil perdu. Paris, 1974.

REFERENCES

Shkunaeva, I. Sovremennaiafrantsuzskaia literatura. Moscow, 1962.
Zonina, L. “Pechal’nyi vzgliad.” In F. Sagan, Nemnogo solntsa v kholodnoi vode i drugiepovesti. Moscow, 1974.
Hourdin, G. Le Cas Françoise Sagan. Paris [1958].
Sénart, P. Chemins critiques. [Paris, 1966.]

Z. A. ZONINA