Jean-Paul Charles Aymard Sartre was a French philosopher, playwright, novelist, screenwriter, political activist, biographer, and literary critic, considered a leading figure in 20th-century French philosophy and Marxism. Sartre was one of the key figures in the philosophy of existentialism. His work has influenced sociology, critical theory, post-colonial theory, and literary studies. He was awarded the 1964 Nobel Prize in Literature despite attempting to refuse it, saying that he always declined official honors and that "a writer should not allow himself to be turned into an institution."
Eugène Ionesco was a Romanian-French playwright who wrote mostly in French, and was one of the foremost figures of the French avant-garde theatre in the 20th century. Ionesco instigated a revolution in ideas and techniques of drama, beginning with his "anti play", The Bald Soprano which contributed to the beginnings of what is known as the Theatre of the Absurd, which includes a number of plays that, following the ideas of the philosopher Albert Camus, explore concepts of absurdism and surrealism. He was made a member of the Académie française in 1970, and was awarded the 1970 Austrian State Prize for European Literature, and the 1973 Jerusalem Prize.
The theatre of the absurd is a post–World War II designation for particular plays of absurdist fiction written by a number of primarily European playwrights in the late 1950s. It is also a term for the style of theatre the plays represent. The plays focus largely on ideas of existentialism and express what happens when human existence lacks meaning or purpose and communication breaks down. The structure of the plays is typically a round shape, with the finishing point the same as the starting point. Logical construction and argument give way to irrational and illogical speech and to the ultimate conclusion—silence.
Charles Boyer was a French-American actor who appeared in more than 80 films between 1920 and 1976. After receiving an education in drama, Boyer started on the stage, but he found his success in American films during the 1930s. His memorable performances were among the era's most highly praised, in romantic dramas such as The Garden of Allah (1936), Algiers (1938), and Love Affair (1939), as well as the mystery-thriller Gaslight (1944). He received four Oscar nominations for Best Actor. He also appeared as himself on the CBS sitcom I Love Lucy.
Jean Genet was a French novelist, playwright, poet, essayist, and political activist. In his early life he was a vagabond and petty criminal, but he later became a writer and playwright. His major works include the novels The Thief's Journal and Our Lady of the Flowers and the plays The Balcony, The Maids and The Screens.
Jean Carmet was a French actor.
Jules Eugène Louis Jouvet was a French actor, theatre director and filmmaker.
Serge Reggiani was an Italian-French actor and singer. He was born in Reggio Emilia, Italy, and moved to France with his parents at the age of eight.
The Maids is a 1947 play by the French dramatist Jean Genet. It was first performed at the Théâtre de l'Athénée in Paris in a production that opened on 17 April 1947, which Louis Jouvet directed.
The Roads to Freedom is a series of novels by French author Jean-Paul Sartre. Intended as a tetralogy, it was left incomplete, with only three complete volumes and part one of the fourth volume of the planned four volumes published in his lifetime and the unfinished second part of the fourth volume was edited and published a year after his death.
Nausea is a philosophical novel by the existentialist philosopher Jean-Paul Sartre, published in 1938. It is Sartre's first novel.
The Balcony is a play by the French dramatist Jean Genet. It is set in an unnamed city that is experiencing a revolutionary uprising in the streets; most of the action takes place in an upmarket brothel that functions as a microcosm of the regime of the establishment under threat outside.
Our Lady of the Flowers (Notre-Dame-des-Fleurs) is the debut novel of French writer Jean Genet, first published in 1943. The free-flowing, poetic novel is a largely autobiographical account of a man's journey through the Parisian underworld. The characters are drawn after their real-life counterparts, who are mostly homosexuals living on the fringes of society.
Jules Romains was a French poet and writer and the founder of the Unanimism literary movement. His works include the play Knock ou le Triomphe de la médecine, and a cycle of works called Les Hommes de bonne volonté . Sinclair Lewis called him one of the six best novelists in the world.
Les Temps Modernes was a French journal, founded by Simone de Beauvoir, Jean-Paul Sartre, and Maurice Merleau-Ponty. Its first issue was published in October 1945. It was named after the 1936 film by Charlie Chaplin.
The Respectful Prostitute is a French play by Jean-Paul Sartre, written in 1946, which observes a white woman, a prostitute, caught up in a racially tense period of American history. The audience understands that there has been an incident on a train with said woman involved, but also a black man on whom the blame is laid by the prejudiced law enforcers. What comes to the viewer's realisation is that a white man instigated an attack, but it is in the interests of the law to preserve the perception of the white person at the expense of the black "devil".
Saint Genet, Actor and Martyr is a book by the French philosopher Jean-Paul Sartre about the writer Jean Genet, especially on his The Thief's Journal. It was first published in 1952. Sartre described it as an attempt "to prove that genius is not a gift but the way out that one invents in desperate cases." Sartre also based his character Goetz in his play The Devil and the Good Lord (1951) on his analysis of Genet's psychology and morality. Sartre has been credited by David M. Halperin with providing, "a brilliant, subtle, and thoroughgoing study of the unique subjectivity and gender positioning of gay men".
The Screens is a play by the French dramatist Jean Genet. Its first few productions all used abridged versions, beginning with its world premiere under Hans Lietzau's direction in Berlin in May 1961. Its first complete performance was staged in Stockholm in 1964, two years before Roger Blin directed its French premiere in Paris.
Francis Jeanson was a French political activist known for his commitment to the FLN during the Algerian war.
Philip Malcolm Waller Thody was an English scholar of French literature who was Professor of French Literature at the University of Leeds from 1965 until 1993.
