Hervé Bazin

French novelist and author of great popularity whose witty and satirical novels often focused on the problems within families and marriages. His works were eventually translated into 30 languages.

After solid academic training, years of family conflict, and financial and professional failure, Hervé, a rebel and bohemian approaching middle age, finally achieved literary fame in 1948 with the autobiographical novel "Vipère au Poing." In the book, he portrayed his unhappy childhood as an unrelenting battle with his mother, who assumed near-mythic proportions through the concentrated energy of her own virulence. His relentless attacks upon the institutions of family, church, and motherhood seemed to many a blasphemy. The revolt continued in "La Tête Contre les Murs," 1949, a novel about penal institutions and the judicial system that supports them, and in a second autobiographical novel, "La Mort du Petit Cheval," 1950.

Having exorcised the demons of his youth in his writings, Bazin underwent a spiritual metamorphosis, from which he emerged a moralist. He discovered paternal love, spiritual fortitude, and conjugal responsibility.

Bazin received numerous awards, including the Lenin Prize in 1979. He was the critic for "Journal du Dimanche" from 1981 and a Member, Vice-President and President of the Goncourt Academy starting from 1958.

Bazin married on 3 February 1934; one child; divorced 13 February 1948. He made a second marriage on 30 April 1948; four kids; divorced 8 February 1967. His third marriage was on 9 May 1967; one child; divorced 14 April 1987, and fourth marriage on 8 August 1987; one child.

Bazin died of a stroke in Angers on 17 February 1996. He was 84.