Wikipedia

Hervé Le Tellier

Hervé Le Tellier (French pronunciation: [ɛʁve lə tɛlje]; born 21 April 1957) is a French writer and linguist, and a member of the international literary group Oulipo (Ouvroir de Littérature Potentielle, which translates roughly as "workshop of potential literature"). He is its fourth president. Other notable members have included Raymond Queneau, Georges Perec, Italo Calvino, Jacques Roubaud, Jean Lescure and Harry Mathews. He won the 2020 Prix Goncourt for The Anomaly.

Hervé Le Tellier
Hervé Le Tellier in 2021
Hervé Le Tellier in 2021
Born (1957-04-21) April 21, 1957 (age 67)
Paris, France
Occupation
  • Novelist
  • poet
  • journalist
LanguageFrench
Alma materCentre de formation des journalistes de Paris
Literary movementOulipo
Notable awardsPrix Goncourt (2020)

Biography

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Born in Paris, Le Tellier started his career as a scientific journalist, and joined Oulipo in 1992. As an author, he came to general attention in 1998 with the publication in France of his book Les amnésiques n'ont rien vécu d'inoubliable, a collection of one thousand very short sentences all beginning with "Je pense que" (I think that), published in English as A Thousand Pearls (for a Thousand Pennies). His rather complex novel Le voleur de nostalgie is a tribute to the Italian writer Italo Calvino. He is also one of the participants of Papous dans la tête, the cult literary quiz of France Culture, the French cultural radio station.

He became in 2002 a daily contributor to the website of the newspaper Le Monde with a short satirical chronicle called Papier de verre ("sandpaper"). He founded, with Frederic Pages and others, the "Association of Friends of Jean-Baptiste Botul" to promote this fictitious philosopher and his school of "Botulism".

One of his most recent publications is Esthétique de l’Oulipo (The Aesthetics of Oulipo), a very personal essay on literature under constraint, considered from a linguistic perspective.

Seven of his books have been translated into English, from Enough about love (Other Press) to The Sextine Chapel (Dalkey Archive).

Award

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Published books

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In English

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  • The Sextine Chapel, translated by Ian Monk, Dalkey Archive Press, 2011. ISBN 978-1-56478-575-6
  • A Thousand Pearls (for a Thousand Pennies), translated by Ian Monk, Dalkey Archive Press, 2011, ISBN 1-56478-636-6.
  • Enough About Love, translated by Adriana Hunter, Other Press, 2011, ISBN 978-1-59051-399-6
  • The Intervention of a Good Man, translated by Adriana Hunter, Other Press, 2011, ISBN 978-1-59051-492-4
  • Electrico W, translated by Adriana Hunter, Other Press, 2013, ISBN 978-1-59051-533-4. For her translation, Adriana Hunter won the 27th Annual Translation Prize founded by the French-American Foundation and the Florence Gould Foundation.
  • All happy families, translated by Adriana Hunter, Other Press, March 2019, ISBN 978-1-59051-938-7.
  • Atlas inutilis, in French Contes liquides, "Fluid fables", translated by Cole Swensen, Black Square Editions, 2018, ISBN 978-0-9860050-9-1.
  • The Anomaly, translated by Adriana Hunter, Other Press, November 2021, ISBN 978-1-63542-169-9.

In English, with Oulipo

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