French Literature Reviews - 2026

B. Alavoine, Michel Déon. Un regard désenchanté
Writers: Biography, Letters and Memoirs

Bibliographic reference: B. Alavoine, Michel Déon. Un regard désenchanté, 2019.

Bernard Alavoine

Michel Déon. Un regard désenchanté

Presses Universitaires de Dijon, 2018

114 p.

10.5 x 17.5 cm

978-2-36441-267-5

Publisher's overview:

When Michel Déon passed away in December 2016, the press paid a rather subdued tribute to the "last of the Hussars." The writer was no longer in the spotlight, and the author of Poneys sauvages was often criticized for his political stances. Critics gradually came to realize that this "novelist of happiness," praised for his carefree attitude, actually cast a disenchanted gaze upon his era. His move to Greece served as a temporary response to this unease, which is reflected in his major novels of the 1970s.
Michel Déon is also the discreet author of short stories and plays, not to mention the narratives and chronicles in which he excels. Ireland became his ultimate refuge: nostalgia is omnipresent in his later works, lifting the veil slightly on a reserved and private writer.
This essay attempts to capture a literary output that remains an essential testimony to the upheavals of the twentieth century.

Michel Déon is frequently associated with the Hussars, a French literary movement of the mid-twentieth century. While often perceived as a carefree writer, Déon developed a disillusioned perspective on his era. Bernard Alavoine's essay attempts to capture Déon's diverse literary output, which includes novels, short stories, plays, and chronicles.

His moves to Greece and Ireland served as responses to his unease, with nostalgia becoming omnipresent in his later works. Alavoine's essay presents this literary output as a testimony to the upheavals of the twentieth century. Readers interested in post-war French fiction may find this volume relevant.