Romain Gary
Subtitle: The Man Who Sold His Shadow (Critical Authors and Issues)
Publisher: University of Pennsylvania Press
Published: March 2002
Language: eng
Format: Hardcover
Number of pages: 224
ISBN-13: 9780812236460
Subjects: Biography & Autobiography; Literature: History & Criticism; Biography/Autobiography; Biography; Biography / Autobiography; Literary; European - French; Biography & Autobiography / Literary; Authors, French; 20th century; Anonyms and pseudonyms; Gary, Romain
First sentence: Having adopted a French spelling of his first name, "Romain Kacew" signed his first publications in 1935: two short stories, "L'orage" and "Une petite femme," appeared in the French paper Gringoire.
Description: "In Romain Gary: The Man Who Sold His Shadow, Ralph Schoolcraft explores the extraordinary career of the modern French author, film director, and diplomat - a romantic and tragic figure whose fictions extended well beyond his books. Born Roman Kacew, he overcame an impoverished boyhood to become a French Resistance hero and win the coveted Goncourt Prize under the pseudonym - and largely invented persona - Romain Gary.

Although he published such acclaimed works as The Roots of Heaven and Promise at Dawn, the Gaullist traditions that he defended in the world of French letters fell from favor, and his critical fortunes suffered at the hands of a hostile press. Schoolcraft details Gary's frustrated struggle to evolve as a writer in the eye of a public that now considered him a known quantity.

Identifying the daring strategies used by this mysterious character as he undertook an elaborate scheme to reach a new readership, Schoolcraft offers new insight into the dynamics of authorship and fame within the French literary institutions."--BOOK JACKET.