About the Author

Julien Gracq (1910-2007) taught history and geography in various lycees. A close friend of Andre Breton, his work was inspired by German Romanticism, and combines startling imagery with a rich, precise metre.
Staunchly avoiding the French literary scene-he refused the Prix Goncourt in 1951-he is one of the few authors to have been published in the Bibliotheque de la Pleiade during his lifetime. He died in 2007 aged 97.
Julien Gracq's A Dark Stranger is also available from Pushkin Press.

Reviews

A black diamond -- Edmond Jaloux [Gracq] is... the best landscape gardener of our literature-more precise than Chateaubriand, more musical than Stendhal, more sensual than Proust Telerama