French Literature Reviews - 2026
Anne Struve-Debeaux (ed.), Pierre Benoit, Master of the Adventure Novel.
Novel and Narrative Prose
Pierre Benoit, Master of the Adventure Novel
Edited by Anne Struve-Debeaux
Publisher's Overview:
A prolific novelist and avid traveler, Pierre Benoit published around forty novels. Among his best-known works are Kœnigsmark (1918), L’Atlantide (1919), Mademoiselle de La Ferté (1923), La Châtelaine du Liban (1924), Axelle (1928)... Tinged with a certain eroticism and frequently blending adventure, fantasy, and exoticism, his work achieved considerable success in the first half of the 20th century and undeniably left its mark on the fiction of his era ― indeed, it was Kœnigsmark that was chosen by Librairie générale française to inaugurate the Livre de Poche collection in 1953. His work also inspired cinema at a very early stage, with several adaptations, including those of L’Atlantide by Jacques Feyder in 1921 and Georg Wilhelm Pabst in 1932. The essays gathered in this volume aim specifically to resituate his work within its historical context and to understand its underlying mechanisms, balanced between erudition, grounding in reality, and inventiveness.
Table of Contents:
Gérard de Cortanze – Preface
Anne Struve-Debeaux – Foreword
Frédéric Barbier – Pierre Benoit and the History of the Book
Luc Rasson – Is Pierre Benoit Modern?
Adventure Reinvented:
Hossein Tengour – The Prose of Pierre Benoit: Between Adventure Novel and Poetic Narrative
Paul Kawczak – The Death of the Adventurer
Edith Perry – Mademoiselle de La Ferté: A Poetics of Ambiguity
The Other, The Elsewhere
Jean Arrouye – Erromango: A Negative Assessment of Colonization
Hélène Tatsopoulou – Saint-Jean d’Acre by Pierre Benoit, at the Crossroads of Cultures and Passions
At the Sources of the Work
Chantal Foucrier – L’Atlantide, or the Art of Making Do with Leftovers
Thierry Ozwald – Pierre Benoit, a Disciple of Mérimée
Anne Struve-Debeaux – Contemporary Reality and Literary Creation in Notre-Dame de Tortose
Stéphane Maltere – What a Manuscript by Pierre Benoit Teaches Us: The Case of La Sainte Vehme (1958)
The Element of Erudition
Catherine Helbert – The Reception of Pierre Benoit by the NRF and Benjamin Crémieux. From Trashing... to Praise?
Jean-François Croz – Pierre Benoit and the Scholarly World: Between Seduction and Derision
Cinematic Adaptations
Erik Pesenti-Rossi – Antinea on Screen: Myth, Pastiche, "Normality".
Peter Schulman – Pabst’s Saharan Lichtspiel: L’Atlantide on the Couch of Desire.
Writers' Perspectives
Henri Lhéritier – A Vertical View of Pierre Benoit.
Stéphane Héaume – In Defense of Pierre Benoit.
Published with the support of the Centre des sciences des littératures en langue française (CSLF), the University of Paris Ouest Nanterre La Défense, the French Ministry of Culture and Communication, and the CNL.
Editions Hermann
Paris, August 2015
314 pages - Format 15 x 23 cm
20 B&W illustrations
ISBN: 9782705690816
€32.00
Pierre Benoit was a prolific novelist and avid traveler who published around forty novels, among his best-known works being Kœnigsmark (1918), L’Atlantide (1919), Mademoiselle de La Ferté (1923), La Châtelaine du Liban (1924), and Axelle (1928). His work frequently blended adventure, fantasy, and exoticism, and it achieved considerable success in the first half of the 20th century. Kœnigsmark was chosen by Librairie générale française to inaugurate the Livre de Poche collection in 1953. His work also inspired early cinema, with several adaptations including those of L’Atlantide by Jacques Feyder in 1921 and Georg Wilhelm Pabst in 1932.
The essays gathered in this volume aim specifically to resituate his work within its historical context and to understand its underlying mechanisms, balanced between erudition, grounding in reality, and inventiveness. The table of contents includes contributions by Gérard de Cortanze, Anne Struve-Debeaux, Frédéric Barbier, Luc Rasson, Hossein Tengour, Paul Kawczak, Edith Perry, Jean Arrouye, Hélène Tatsopoulou, Chantal Foucrier, Thierry Ozwald, Stéphane Maltere, Catherine Helbert, Jean-François Croz, Erik Pesenti-Rossi, Peter Schulman, Henri Lhéritier, and Stéphane Héaume. Readers interested in French literature and popular narrative traditions may find this volume relevant.