2021-02-19 Fri

Andre Gide, a French writer, humanist, and moralist who received the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1947. In 1889 he decided to spend his life in writing, music, and travel. His first work was an autobiographical study of youthful unrest entitled Les Cahiers d’Andre Walter.

The author of more than fifty books, at the time of his death his obituary in The New York Times described him as "France's greatest contemporary man of letters" and "judged the greatest French writer of this century by the literary cognoscenti."

In 1930 Gide published a book about the Blanche Monnier case called La Sequestree de Poitiers. Monnier was a young woman who was kept captive by her own mother for more than 25 years. In 1939, Gide became the first living author to be published in the prestigious Bibliothèque de la Pleiade.

Andre Gide's writings spanned many genres – "As a master of prose narrative, occasional dramatist and translator, literary critic, letter writer, essayist, and diarist, André Gide provided twentieth-century French literature with one of its most intriguing examples of the man of letters."

He appeared on various stamps issued around the world. Depicted here is a 24 Luxembourgish franc stamp issued by Luxembourg Postal Department in 2001. It depicts his portrait in the foreground.

Image Source: colnect.com