Jean-Patrick Manchette
Encyclopedia
Jean-Patrick Manchette was a French
crime
novelist credited with reinventing and reinvigorating the genre. He wrote ten short novels in the seventies and early eighties. His stories are violent, existentialist explorations of the human condition and French society. Manchette was politically to the left and his writing reflects this through his analysis of social positions and culture. His books are reminiscent of the nouvelle vague
crime films of Jean-Pierre Melville, employing a similarly cool, existential style on a typically American genre (film noir
for Melville and pulp novels for Manchette).
Two of his novels (3 To Kill [from the French "Le petit bleu de la côte ouest"] and The Prone Gunman [from the French "La Position du tireur couché"]) have been translated into English and published by San Francisco publisher City Lights Books. A third, "Fatale," was released by New York Review Books
Classics in 2011. In 2009, Fantagraphics Books
released an English language version of French cartoonist Jacques Tardi's adaptation of Le petit bleu, under the new English title West Coast Blues. Fantagraphics will release a second Tardi adaptation, of "La Position du tireur couché" (under the title "Like a Sniper Lining Up His Shot" ) in the summer of 2011.
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
crime
Crime fiction
Crime fiction is the literary genre that fictionalizes crimes, their detection, criminals and their motives. It is usually distinguished from mainstream fiction and other genres such as science fiction or historical fiction, but boundaries can be, and indeed are, blurred...
novelist credited with reinventing and reinvigorating the genre. He wrote ten short novels in the seventies and early eighties. His stories are violent, existentialist explorations of the human condition and French society. Manchette was politically to the left and his writing reflects this through his analysis of social positions and culture. His books are reminiscent of the nouvelle vague
French New Wave
The New Wave was a blanket term coined by critics for a group of French filmmakers of the late 1950s and 1960s, influenced by Italian Neorealism and classical Hollywood cinema. Although never a formally organized movement, the New Wave filmmakers were linked by their self-conscious rejection of...
crime films of Jean-Pierre Melville, employing a similarly cool, existential style on a typically American genre (film noir
Film noir
Film noir is a cinematic term used primarily to describe stylish Hollywood crime dramas, particularly those that emphasize cynical attitudes and sexual motivations. Hollywood's classic film noir period is generally regarded as extending from the early 1940s to the late 1950s...
for Melville and pulp novels for Manchette).
Two of his novels (3 To Kill [from the French "Le petit bleu de la côte ouest"] and The Prone Gunman [from the French "La Position du tireur couché"]) have been translated into English and published by San Francisco publisher City Lights Books. A third, "Fatale," was released by New York Review Books
New York Review Books
New York Review Books is the publishing house of The New York Review of Books. Its imprints are New York Review Books Classics, New York Review Books Collections, and The New York Review Children's Collection....
Classics in 2011. In 2009, Fantagraphics Books
Fantagraphics Books
Fantagraphics Books is an American publisher of alternative comics, classic comic strip anthologies, magazines, graphic novels, and the adult-oriented Eros Comix imprint...
released an English language version of French cartoonist Jacques Tardi's adaptation of Le petit bleu, under the new English title West Coast Blues. Fantagraphics will release a second Tardi adaptation, of "La Position du tireur couché" (under the title "Like a Sniper Lining Up His Shot" ) in the summer of 2011.
Source
- Benoît MouchartBenoit MouchartBorn on July 20, 1976, Benoit Mouchart is an author, curator and, since 2003, artistic director of the cultural programming of Angoulême International Comics Festival, in France....
, Manchette, le nouveau roman noir, éditions Séguier-Archimbaud, 2006 ISBN 2-840-49495-7