Letters on Art and Literature

The Nobel Prize–winning author of Thérèse Desqueyroux shares fascinating insights through correspondence with Albert Camus, Jean Cocteau, and others.

Best known as France’s great Catholic novelist, François Mauriac was also a playwright, poet, critic, journalist, and member of the Académie Française. He was an influential public intellectual who criticized the Catholic church for supporting Francisco Franco and opposed French rule in Vietnam. As a columnist for Le Figaro, Mauriac engaged in a famous dispute with Albert Camus about the course of France after its liberation from Nazi occupation.

In this collection of letters, Mauriac delves into a variety of topics—from the death of Georges Bernanos to the correspondence between Paul Claudel and Andre Gide, and the Routier youth movement—in exchanges with fellow authors, artists, and intellectuals, as well as the readers of his various articles and columns.