French literature

Information about French literature

French and
Francophone literature
French literature

French language
French literary history
Medieval
16th century - 17th century
18th century - 19th century
20th century - Contemporary
Francophone literature
Francophone literature
Literature of Quebec
Postcolonial literature
Literature of Haiti
French language authors
Chronological list
French Writers
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Forms
- Poetry -
Genres
Science Fiction - Comics
Fantastique - Detective Fiction
Movements
Naturalism - Symbolism
Surrealism - Existentialism
Nouveau Roman
Theater of the Absurd
Criticism & Awards
Literary theory -
Most visited
Molire - Racine - Balzac
Stendhal - Flaubert
Emile Zola - Marcel Proust
Samuel Beckett - Albert Camus
This article is a general introduction to French literature. For detailed information on French literature in specific historic periods, see the separate historical articles in the template to the right.


French literature is, generally speaking, literature written in the French language, particularly by citizens of France; it may also refer to literature written by people living in France who speak other traditional non-French languages. Literature written in French by citizens of other nations such as Belgium, Switzerland, Canada, Senegal, Algeria, Morocco, etc. is referred to as Francophone literature.

French literature

The French language is a romance dialect derived from Vulgar Latin and heavily influenced principally by Celtic and Frankish. Beginning in the 11th century, literature written in medieval French was one of the oldest vernacular (non-Latin) literatures in western Europe and it became a key source of literary themes in the Middle Ages across the continent.

Although the European prominence of French literature was eclipsed in part by vernacular literature in Italy in the 14th century, literature in France in the 16th century underwent a major creative evolution, and through the political and artistic programs of the Ancien Régime, French literature came to dominate European letters in the 17th century.

In the 18th century, French became the literary lingua franca and diplomatic language of western Europe (and, to a certain degree, in America), and French letters have had a profound impact on all European and American literary traditions while at the same time being heavily influenced by these other national traditions (for example: British and German Romanticism in the nineteenth century). French literary developments of the 19th and 20th centuries have had a particularly strong effect on modern world literature, including: symbolism, naturalism, the "roman-fleuves" of Balzac, Zola and Proust, surrealism, existentialism, and the "theater of the absurd".

French imperialism and colonialism in the Americas, Africa, and the far East have brought the French language to non-European cultures that are transforming and adding to the French literary experience today.

Under the aristocratic ideals of the ancien régime (the "honnête homme"), the nationalist spirit of post-revolutionary France, and the mass educational ideals of the Third Republic and modern France, the French have come to have a profound cultural attachment to their literary heritage. Today, French schools emphasize the study of novels, theater and poetry (often learnt by heart). The literary arts are heavily sponsored by the state and literary prizes are major news. The Académie française and the Institut de France are important linguistic and artistic institutions in France, and French television features shows on writers and poets (the most watched show in French history was Apostrophes, a weekly talk show on literature and the arts). Literature matters deeply to the people of France and plays an important role in their sense of identity.

As of 2006, French literary people have been awarded more Nobel Prizes in Literature than novelists, poets and essayists of any other country, although writers in English have won twice as many Nobels as the French.

Literatures of other languages of France

Besides literature written in the French language, the literary culture of France may include literature written in other languages of France. In the medieval period many of the competing standard languages in various territories that later came to make up the territory of modern France each produced literary traditions, such as Anglo-Norman literature and Provençal literature.

Literature in the regional languages continued through to the 18th century, although increasing eclipsed by the rise of the French language and influenced by the prevailing French literary model. Conscious language revival movements in the 19th century, such as Félibrige in Provence, coupled with wider literacy and regional presses, enabled a new flowering of literary production in the Norman language and others.

Frédéric Mistral, a poet in Occitan (1830-1914), was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1904.

Breton literature since the 1920s has been lively, despite the falling number of speakers. In 1925, Roparz Hemon founded the periodical Gwalarn which for 19 years tried to raise the language to the level of other great "international" languages by creating original works covering all genres and by proposing Breton translations of internationally recognized foreign works. In 1946, Al Liamm took up the role of Gwalam. Other reviews came into existence and gave Breton a fairly large body of literature for a minority language. Among writers in Breton are Yann-Ber Kalloc'h, Anjela Duval and Per-Jakez Hélias.

Picard literature maintains a level of literary output, especially in theatrical writing. Walloon literature is bolstered by the more significant literary production in the language in Belgium.

Catalan literature and literature in the Basque language also benefit from the existence of a readership outside the borders of France.

French Nobel Prize in Literature winners

The following French or French language authors have won a Nobel Prize in Literature:

Selected list of French literary classics

Fiction

Poetry

Theater

Non-fiction

Literary criticism

Poetry

Main article: French poetry

See also

External links

French (français, pronounced [fʁɑ̃ˈsɛ]) is a Romance language originally spoken in France, Belgium, Luxembourg, and Switzerland, and today by about 300 million people around the world as either
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Medieval French literature is, for the purpose of this article, literature written in Oïl languages (particularly Old French and early Middle French) during the period from the eleventh century to the end of the fifteenth century.
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French Renaissance literature is, for the purpose of this article, literature written in French (Middle French) from the French invasion of Italy in 1494 to 1600, or roughly the period from the reign of Charles VIII of France to the ascension of Henri IV of France to the throne.
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French literature of the 17th century spans the reigns of Henry IV of France, the Regency of Marie de Medici, Louis XIII of France, the Regency of Anne of Austria (and the civil war called the Fronde) and the reign of Louis XIV of France.
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French literature of the 18th century spans the period from the death of Louis XIV of France, through the Régence (during the minority of Louis XV) and the reigns of Louis XV of France and Louis XVI of France to the start of the French Revolution.
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French literature of the nineteenth century is, for the purpose of this article, literature written in French from (roughly) 1799 to 1900. Many of the developments in French literature in this period parallel changes in the visual arts.
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French literature of the twentieth century is, for the purpose of this article, literature written in French from (roughly) 1895 to 1990. For literature made after 1990, see the article Contemporary French literature.
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Contemporary French literature is, for the purpose of this article, literature written in French from (roughly) the 1990s to today.

Overview

The economic, political and social crises of contemporary France -- exclusion, immigration, unemployment, racism, etc.
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Francophone literature is literature written in the French language. Most often the term is misused to refer only to literature from francophone countries outside France, but this category includes French Literature, or Literature of France, that is literature written by
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This is an article about literature in Quebec, a province of Canada.

16th and 17th centuries

During this period, the society of New France was being built with great difficulty.
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Postcolonial literature (less often spelled "Post-colonial literature", sometimes called "New English Literature(s)") is literature concerned with the political and cultural independence of people formerly subjugated in colonial empires, and the literary expression of
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The Culture of Haiti encompasses a variety of Haitian traditions, from native Taino customs to practices imported during French colonisation and Spanish imperialism. As in the cases of Cuba and the Dominican Republic (but to a much larger degree), Haiti is a Afro-Latin nation with
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Chronological list of French language authors (regardless of nationality), by date of birth. For an alphabetical list of writers of French nationality (broken down by genre), see .

Middle Ages

  • Turold (eleventh century)
  • Wace (1110 - c.

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French poetry is a category of French literature. It may include Francophone poetry composed outside France and poetry written in other languages of France.

French prosody and poetics


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French science fiction is a substantial genre within French literature. Arguably dating back further than English science fiction, it remains an active and productive genre which has evolved in conjunction with anglophone science fiction and other French and international
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Franco-Belgian comics are comics that are created in Belgium and France. These countries have a long tradition in comics and comic books, where they are known as BDs, an abbreviation of bande dessinée (literally drawn strip) in French and stripverhalen
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Fantasy media
  • Fantastic art
  • Fantasy anime
  • Fantasy art
  • Fantasy authors
  • Fantasy comics
  • Fantasy fiction magazines
  • Fantasy films
  • Fantasy literature
  • Fantasy television
Genre studies

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Naturalism is a movement in theater, film, and literature that seeks to replicate a believable everyday reality, as opposed to such movements as Romanticism or Surrealism, in which subjects may receive highly symbolic, idealistic, or even supernatural treatment.
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Symbolism was a late nineteenth century art movement of French and Belgian origin in poetry and other arts.

Precursors and origins

Symbolism was largely a reaction against Naturalism and Realism, anti-idealistic movements which attempted to capture reality in its gritty
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Surrealism
Surrealism and film
Surrealism and music
Surrealist Manifesto
Surrealist techniques
Surrealist games
Surrealist humor
Surrealism[1]
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Existentialism is a philosophical movement which claims that individual human beings create the meanings and essence of their own lives.

It is a reaction against more traditional philosophies, such as rationalism and empiricism, which sought to discover an ultimate order in
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nouveau roman (French: "new novel") is a type of 1950s French novel that diverged from classical literary genres. Émile Henriot coined the title in an article in the popular French newspaper Le Monde
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The Theatre of the Absurd, or Theater of the Absurd (French: "Le Théâtre de l'Absurde") is a designation for particular plays written by a number of primarily European playwrights in the late 1940s, 1950s, and 1960s, as well as to the style of theatre which has
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Literary theory is the theory (or the philosophy) of the interpretation of literature and literary criticism. Its history begins with classical Greek poetics and rhetoric and includes, since the 18th century, aesthetics and hermeneutics.
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Jean Racine (French IPA: [ʁa'sin]) (December 22, 1639 – April 21, 1699) was a French dramatist, one of the "big three" of 17th century France (along with Molière and Corneille).
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Marie-Henri Beyle (January 23, 1783 – March 23, 1842), better known by his penname Stendhal, was a 19th-century French writer. Known for his acute analysis of his characters' psychology, he is considered one of the earliest and foremost practitioners of realism in his
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Gustave Flaubert

Gustave Flaubert
Born: 12 November 1821(1821--)
Rouen, France
Died: 8 May 1880
Rouen, France
Occupation: Novelist, playwright
Nationality:  France
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Émile Zola

Born: March 2 1840(1840--)

Died: September 29 1902 (aged 62)

Occupation: novelist, playwright, journalist
Nationality: French
Genres: Naturalism
French literature
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Marcel Proust

Born: July 10 1871(1871--)
Auteuil, France
Died: November 18 1922 (aged 51)
Paris, France
Occupation: Novelist, essayist, critic
Genres: modernism
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Samuel Beckett

Pseudonym: Andrew Belis (Recent Irish Poetry)[1]
Born: 13 March 1906(1906--)
Foxrock, Dublin, Ireland
Died: 22 November 1989 (aged 83)
Paris, France
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