Belmont(-Pelorson), Georges (Jean-Claude) 1909-

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BELMONT(-PELORSON), Georges (Jean-Claude) 1909-

PERSONAL: Born July 19, 1909, in Belley, France; son of Jean (an inspector of schools) and Marguerite (Monnet) Pelorson; married Eileen Graham, September, 1931 (divorced, 1954); married Josephine Caliot, June, 1954 (divorced); some sources also cite a marriage to Marcelle O'Connell; children: (first marriage) Sophie (Mrs. Guy Genovesi). Education: Attended École Normale Supérieure (Paris, France). Politics: "Never belonged to any party." Religion: "Pantheism."

ADDRESSES: Home—20 quai de la Megisserie, Paris 1, France. Agent—Boris Hoffmann and Georges Hoffman, 77 blvd. Saint-Michel, Paris 6, France.

CAREER: Journalist, writing on foreign affairs for Paris-Midi and Paris-Soir, Paris, France, between 1931 and 1940; Paris-Match, Paris, editor in chief, 1953-54; Jours de France, Paris, founder and editor in chief, 1954-56; Marie-Claire, Paris, editor in chief, 1957-60; Editions Robert Laffont, Paris, editor and director of two foreign fiction series, 1967-79; writer, 1979—. Volontés, founder (with Raymond Queneau, Henry Miller, Le Corbusier, and Frédéric Joliot-Curie) and director, 1932-40; Arts, Paris, director, 1953-64; l'Action Automobile, past editor in chief. Trinity College, Dublin, Ireland, reader, 1929; also taught at École Normale Supérieure, Paris. French Bureau of Information, chief, 1941-42; Secrétariat général de la jeunesse (secretary general of the youth), 1942-43. Director of bilingual school, Paris, 1936-40. Military service: French Army, Infantry, 1939-40; taken prisoner by the Germans, 1940.

WRITINGS:

Connaissance (poetry), Fustier (Paris, France), 1937.

Jules Cesar (tragedy in verse), Editions du Chene (Paris, France), 1939.

Le Grand pressoir (novel), Editions Robert Laffont (Paris, France), 1957.

Chris (novel), René Julliard (Paris, France), 1965. Un homme au crépuscule (novel), René Julliard (Paris, France), 1966.

Ex (novel), Denoël (Paris, France), 1969.

L'Honneur de vivre (poetry), Editions Poesie I (Paris, France), 1970.

Entretiens de Paris, Stock (Paris, France), 1970, translation by Antony Macnabb and Harry Scott published as Face to Face with Henry Miller: Conversations with Georges Belmont, Sidgwick & Jackson (London, England), 1971, reprinted as Henry Miller in Conversation with Georges Belmont, Quadrangle Books (Chicago, IL), 1972.

(With Céleste Albaret) Monsieur Proust, Editions Robert Laffont (Paris, France), 1973, McGraw-Hill (New York, NY), 1976, translation by Barbara Bray published as Monsieur Proust, McGraw-Hill (New York, NY), 1976, reprinted with foreword by André Aciman, New York Review Books (New York, NY), 2003.

Souvenirs d'outre-monde: histoire d'une naissance (autobiography), Calmann-Lévy (Paris, France), 2001.

Also author of an essay, De l'enfant a la nation. Translator of almost seventy books from English into French, including the works of Henry James, Henry Miller, Evelyn Waugh, Graham Greene, Jawaharlal Nehru, and Mahatma Gandhi. Contributor to periodicals.

SIDELIGHTS: Georges Belmont once told CA that he was influenced in his choice of vocation by a father who wrote poetry and urged his son to read such poets as Tasso and Goethe when the boy was eight, and by an uncle who spent all of his life in England. Other major influences, he wrote, included "Meeting J. Joyce in 1930 and becoming a friend of his; a valid friendship with Samuel Beckett dating back to 1928; meeting Henry Miller in 1937 and being his friend since then." Regarding other writers and their work, Belmont told CA: "I follow Joyce's advice to me. One day when we were walking along the Seine he said 'I don't read my contemporaries.'" He offered the following advice to aspiring writers: "Be merciless with yourself. Never write for money or in the hope of making money."