Paul Léautaud


Paul Léautaud was a French writer and theater critic for Mercure de France, signing his often caustic reviews with the pseudonym Maurice Boissard.

Life

He was born in Paris. Abandoned by his mother, an opera singer, soon after birth, his father, Firmin, brought him up. The two lived in no 13 and later no 21 of Rue des Martyrs, in Courbevoie. "At that time, my father used to go down to the cafe every morning, before lunch. He had thirteen dogs. He was walking down the rue des Martyrs with his dogs and holding a whip in his hand, which he did not use for dogs."
Léautaud became interested in the Comédie-Française and wondered around the corridors and backstage of the theater. His father remarried and had another son, Maurice.
Léautaud studied at the Courbevoie municipal school, where he met Adolphe van Bever. In 1887, at the age of 15, he moved to Paris to work doing small jobs.
"For eight years, I ate lunch and dinner on a four-penny cheese, a piece of bread, a glass of water, and a little coffee. Poverty, I never thought about it, I never suffered from it."
In 1894, Léautaud became a clerk in an attorney's office, the Barberon firm at 17 quai Voltaire. From 1902 to 1907, he dealt with the liquidation of estates with a judicial administrator, Mr. Lemarquis, rue Louis-le-Grand. He was attracted to letters which he read until the late night: Barrès, Renan, Taine, Diderot, Voltaire, and Stendhal.
"I learned on my own, by myself, without anyone, without rules, without arbitrary direction, what I liked, what seduced me, what corresponded to the nature of my mind."
In 1895, he brought to the Mercure de France a poem, Elégie, in the Symbolist taste of the time. Director Alfred Vallette agreed to publish it in the September issue. His collaborations evolved into his writing around 1900.

As others viewed him

He was portrayed by painter Simon-Auguste in 1956. "Paul Léautaud, écrivain, dans sa maison de Fontenay-aux-Roses" is in the Musée Carnavalet, in Paris.
Guillaume Apollinaire's famous poem "Le Chanson du mal-aimé," from Alcools, is dedicated to Léautaud.
According to Nancy Mitford in The Letters of Nancy Mitford and Evelyn Waugh, Leautaud was an eccentric literary critic and diarist who said he loved cats and dogs more than people, lived on nothing but potatoes and cheese for eight years, and never travelled further than Calais.
Mavis Gallant profiled him in her Paris Notebooks:

Works

  • 1900: Poètes d'Aujourd'hui, morceaux choisis accompagnés de notices biographiques et d'un essai de bibliographie with Adolphe van Bever, Mercure de France
  • 1903: Le Petit Ami Société du Mercure de France
  • 1926: Le Théâtre de Maurice Boissard : 1907-1923
  • 1928: Passe-Temps, Mercure de France
  • 1942: Notes retrouvées : « Lundi 25 août 1941. En triant de vieux papiers, je retrouve une série de notes que j'avais bien oubliées. Je ne sais plus si je les ai utilisées, ni si elles se trouvent à leur place dans mon "Journal". Je les regroupe ici par ordre de dates. »
  • 1943: Le Théâtre de Maurice Boissard - 1907-1923 - avec un supplément
  • 1945: Marly-le-Roy et environs, Éditions du Bélier
  • 1951: Entretiens avec Robert Mallet, Gallimard
  • 1954 to 1966: Journal littéraire 19 volumes
  • 1956: In Memoriam
  • 1956: Lettres à ma mère, Mercure de France
  • 1956: Le Fléau. Journal particulier 1917-1930, Mercure de France
  • 1958: Amours
  • 1958: Le Théâtre de Maurice Boissard : 1915-1941
  • 1959: Bestiaire, Grasset
  • 1963: Poésies
  • 1964: Le Petit ouvrage inachevé
  • 1966: Lettres à Marie Dormoy, Éditions Albin Michel, réimprimé en 1988.
  • 1968: Journal littéraire, Choix par Pascal Pia et Maurice Guyot
  • 1986: Journal particulier 1933, présenté par Edith Silve, Mercure de France
  • 2001: Correspondance de Paul Léautaud. Tome 1, 1878-1928 recueillie par Marie Dormoy
  • 2001: Correspondance de Paul Léautaud. Tome 2, 1929-1956 recueillie par Marie Dormoy
  • 2004: Chronique poétique, Éditions Sigalla
  • 2012: Journal particulier 1935, présenté par Edith Silve, Mercure de France