Monnier, Adrienne (c. 1892–1955)

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Monnier, Adrienne (c. 1892–1955)

French bookseller, writer, and publisher. Born c. 1892; committed suicide in France on June 19, 1955, a victim of Mènière's syndrome (aural disturbances of inner ear); dau. of Clovis Monnier; elder sister of Marie Monnier; companion of bookseller Sylvia Beach.

Founded Maison des Amis Livres (The House of the Friends of Books, 1915), where she sold works of significant new French writers; bookshop became a French literary center, frequented by the likes of André Gide, Jean Schlumberger, Paul Valéry, Jean-Paul Fargue, Erik Satie, Valéry Larbaud and Jules Romain; was also responsible for the French language publication of Ulysses and the costly, short-lived magazine Le Navire d'Argent.

See also autobiography The Very Rich Hours of Adrienne Monnier (trans. by Richard McDougall, Bison, 1996); and Women in World History.