Alain-Fournier

(French, 1886–1914)

Alain-Fournier (real name Henri Alban Fournier) wrote his enduringly popular novel Le Grand Meaulnes when he was 26; he was killed in action in 1914. Le Grand Meaulnes is a magical, haunting novel about adolescence, narrated by François, the son of a schoolmaster. A charismatic older lad, Augustin Meaulnes, comes to board at the school and takes François under his wing. One day le Grand Meaulnes (as the other boys call him) gets lost in the countryside and discovers a mysterious domain full of happy children feasting and celebrating. There he meets a beautiful girl, who haunts him ever after. His and François's lives become dominated by the need to find Yvonne again. Mysterious events are intermingled with precise evocations of boyhood hopes and fears, rivalries and fights, and with the extraordinary glamour of significant teenage moments.

George Eliot (The Mill on the Floss), Miles Franklin (My Brilliant Career).

See CHILDHOOD  JR