26 February 2018

Pierre-Henri Simon, Saint-Fort-sur-Gironde (17), Charente-Maritime (17)

Pierre-Henri Simon (1903–72) was a literary historian, a novelist, poet and literary critic born in Saint-Fort-sur-Gironde, Charente-Maritime. He was elected to the Académie française in 1966. As a seven-year-old his teacher's anti-clerical views shocked him so much that his mother withdrew him from school and taught him for four years. André Malraux admired his work, he narrowly missed gaining the Femina for Les hommes ne veulent pas mourir (1953), and his Contre la torture (1957) (concerning his views on the Algerian war, towards which the government of the day was hostile) was defended by François Mitterrand (then Garde des Sceaux). Several streets and squares in different towns in Charente-Maritime are named after him, including Place Pierre-Henri Simon in Saint-Fort-sur-Gironde. He is buried in the cemetery of the town of his birth.


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