Gaston Chérau (6 November 1872 – 20 April 1937) was a French man of letters and journalist.
Gaston Chérau
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Gaston Chérau's grave at Prissac (Indre)
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| Born | 6 November 1872 |
| Died | 20 April 1937(1937-04-20) (aged 64) |
| Occupation(s) | Writer Journalist |
The son of an industrialist, Gaston Chérau died in Boston during a lecture tour. A journalist and chronicler, he regularly gave the press his impressions of travel.
In 1911, he traveled through Tripolitania during the Italo-Turkish War on behalf of Le Matin newspaper.
In 1914, he was a war reporter for the newspaper L'Illustration in Belgium and the North of France.
A fertile novelist of the province, his pen is very influenced by the Berry where he had family roots, stayed a part of his childhood, and where he returned assiduously on vacation in a second home until the end of his life.
He was elected a member of the Académie Goncourt in 1926.
He was also interested in cinema and wrote the dialogues of the film Les Deux mondes (1930) directed by Ewald Andreas Dupont.
He is the author of about forty novels.
A generous epicurean, he prefaced the Histoire du cognacbyRobert Delamain [fr] (Stock, 1935), an archeologist and writer from an old family of merchants in brandy from Jarnac, whose younger brother Jacques (1874–1953), author among others of Portraits d'oiseaux (Stock, 1938 and 1952) was the brother-in-law of the writer Jacques Boutelleau (1884–1968), called Jacques Chardonne.
He wrote a number of works for children such as Jacques Petitpont, roi de Madagascar (J. Ferenczi, 1928, ill. d'Avelot), L'enlèvement de la princesse (Hachette, 1934, ill. André Pécoud ) or Contes et nouvelles de Gascogne (Bibliothèque Nelson illustrée, 1938, ill. Georges Dutriac).[1]
Georges Bernanos described him as a "Maupassant of sub-prefecture", because he had not voted for the Voyage au bout de la nuitbyLouis-Ferdinand Céline at the 1932 edition of the prix Goncourt (Le Figaro, 13 December 1932).
It was, at the Goncourt lunches, the most imaginable charming friend. He animated the table with his rapid and colorful stories. He loved to laugh broadly, but one could feel, behind his laughter, a harsh understanding of life. He wrote, in my opinion, two masterpieces: Champi-Tortu and Petit Dagrello. When I told him, he seemed surprised. His tales of hunter and fisherman have an extraordinary flavor. He was a gourmand, and repeatedly regaled us with cheese-cakes from Bélâbre. He knew and loved the peasant world. His death is a real mourning for the Letters and for his colleagues, whom he had pleasure in compelling. We, the "Goncourt", will often think of him, his joyful entrance, his clairvoyant and sensitive eyes
(Léon Daudet, L’Action française, 22 April 1937).