André Gide – Saint-John Perse
Exhibit and Encounter

from June 20 th to October 25 th 2014
Saint-John Perse Foundation

Vernissage of the exhibit on Friday 20 June, at 20 p. m.,
Preceeded at 19 p. m., Espace "Lecture publique", Méjanes Library, by an encounter with Jean-Pierre Prévost, its author, and with the Professors Henriette Levillain and Frank Lestringant, who are specialists of Gide and Saint-John Perse..

Presentation of the exhibit

At first glance these two great literary figures of the twentieth century have little in common. One, André Gide (1869-1951), the capital contemporain, Much has been written, and in all possible forms : roman, theater, tests, Journal the other ..., Saint-John Perse (1887-1975) essentially poems. One came from a bourgeois family, the other Guadeloupe Creole origin cabbie. They are of different generations : twenty years apart, temperament, their behavior, their goals differ. And yet they will meet, appreciate, will also annoy, and forge bonds of friendship marked by respect and mutual admiration.

The chronologically to tell the story of this exhibition aims to meet, its roots, its anchor points, development, limitations as, as an investigation twists.

Presentation of the encounter

Gide was the eminence grise of many companies whose intellectual NRF. Leger Dating 1911 during his first visit to Paris and lease all his life “historical insight” from “this real French figure of his time”. Yet the relationship started badly with a publication ofPraises in the packed NRF mistakes and shells but Leger would never render Gide responsible although he threatened to never publish this magazine. Still Valery Larbaud devoted an admiring article Praises in The Phalange. Gide and Saint-John Perse keep for nearly forty years a true relationship eclipses but undeniably strong, brief enigmatic.

Participants :
Henriette Levillain, Emeritus Professor at Paris 4 Sorbonne, author Saint John Perse (Fayard Editions, 2013)
and Frank Lestringant, Professeur à la Sorbonne, author’André Gide inquiéteur (Flammarion editions, 2011)
Jean-Pierre Prevost director and television writer. He led the writing of the book André Gide, A family album (Éditions Gallimard/Fondation Catherine Gide 2010) and collaborated with Interviews de Catherine Gide (Gallimard 2009).
Moderation : Antoine Spire, journalist and academic.

click image to enlarge

Just published (June 2014)

André Gide - Saint John Foris - An unusual encounter, 1902-1914, Jean-Pierre Prevost, Éditions Orizons (L'Harmattan), 112 p.