Julian Green

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Green, Julien [Originally Julian] (1900–), brother of Anne Green, was born in Paris of American parents and has lived most of his life in France. His first book, Le Voyageur sur la terre (1927), a novelette translated as The Pilgrim on the Earth (1929), concerns an American college student who dies after being driven insane by hallucinations. Later novels, also written in French, are equally somber psychological studies of individuals, superficially commonplace but actually the prey of deep tortured passions. These include Mont‐Cinère (1926), translated as Avarice House (1927); Adrienne Mésurat (1927), translated as The Closed Garden (1928); Léviathan (1929), translated as The Dark Journey (1929); and, in a recent listing from a prolific career as novelist, Moira (1951); and some untranslated texts, including L'Autre (1983), about a woman's romantic experiences, and Les Pays lointains (1987). Personal Record (1939) is his journal (1928–39), and other works in English translation include the fiction Christine and Other Stories (1930), The Strange River (1932), The Dreamer (1934), Midnight (1936), Then Shall the Dust Return (1941), If I Were You (1949), The Transgressor (1957), about a girl's unhappy love for a homosexual, and Each in His Darkness (1961). Memories of Happy Days (1942) and To Leave Before Dawn (1967) are memoirs and, like his Diary 1928–1957 (1964), were translated by his sister. Still further autobiographical texts are in Terre lointaine (1966); Memories of Evil Days (1976); Ce qu'il faut d'amour a l'homme (1978), about his conversion to Catholicism; Paris (1983); and Villes (1985), concerning various travels. He has also written many journals published in French. God's Fool (1985) is an appreciative study of St. Francis of Assisi.

Julian Green 1900-1998, French writer, b. Paris, of American parentage. Except for the years from 1918 to 1922 and from 1940 to 1945, Green lived in France. His 18 novels, written in French, are somber psychological tales concerning vice and near-madness. Among the best known are The Closed Garden (1927, tr. 1928), The Dark Journey (1929, tr. 1929), Midnight (1936, tr. 1936), Moira (1950, tr. 1951), and L'Autre (1971, tr. 1973). Green's epic historical novel of the American South, The Distant Lands (1987; tr. 1991), was a French bestseller. His plays include Sud (1953), L'Ennemi (1954), and L'Ombre (1956). He was elected to the Académie Française in 1971.

Bibliography: See his autobiography (4 vol.; pub. in full 1984); Diary (1964), a partial translation of the journal that he began keeping in the 1920s; studies by G. S. Burne (1971) and S. Stokes, Jr. (1955, repr. 1972).