Paris 2015: Jean-Baptiste Niel, Cimetière du Père-Lachaise #19

'L'ÉCRIVAIN

Jean-Baptiste

NIEL

1962 – 1995'

 

Jean-Baptiste Niel wrote a thesis on Marie Noël, French teacher and later bookseller. His first novel was Vous qui passez dans l'ombre (1989) (trans. as Painted Shadows) about a transexual prostitute. Ludion d'alcool (1990) came next, followed by Ceci est mon sang (1992), a work Niel said is not so much about AIDS as it is a hymn, a requiem. La Maison Niel (1995) is an autobiography and was published posthumously. He also wrote Rachel, Cathelin (1994) on the painter Bernard Cathelin (1914–2004).

 

Jean-Baptiste Niel died of AIDS. The fullest obituary I've come across is in the Independent by the gay poet James Kirkup (1918–2009), who translated his first novel: Obituary in English.