Gide, André ___ 1869-1951 ___ French ___ writer

BIOGRAPHICAL SUMMARY
Gide was born in Paris, but brought up in Normandy, where he was tutored at home, and where he was often ill. His father was a Paris University professor of law who died when André was only 11, and his uncle was a political economist. During 1893-94, he travelled in northern Africa, meeting Oscar Wilder in Algiers, and began trying to accept his own homosexuality. He also had a fall and was gravely ill. In 1895, after his mother's death, he married his cousin Madeleine Rondeaux but the marriage was never consummated. Although homosexual, Gide did have a daughter, Catherine, in 1923, with Maria Van Rysselberghe. In 1896 he became mayor of a commune in Normandy, and later he was also a juror in Rouen. Gide's 'Fruits of the Earth' appeared in 1897 and was to become one of his most popular works, influencing later writers, such as Camus and Sartre. In it, he preached a doctrine of active hedonism. In later novels, though, he was more careful to examine the problems of individual freedom and responsibility from different points of view. In 1909, Gide helped found the influential literary magazine 'The New French Review', which published many of his essays. From the mid-1920s, Gide began to work for social reforms, demanding more humane conditions for criminals for example. Between 1925 and 1927, he travelled with his friend Marc Allegret, to the Congo; and, from 1942 until the end of the Second World War, he lived in North Africa. His fame grew in the 1940s, and in 1947 he was awarded the Nobel Prize. His diaries are 'witty, candid and compelling' according to Irene and Alan Taylor.
A biography link
Wikipedia bio
The Diary Review - Gide's self scrutiny

DIARY DATES, CONTENT DESCRIPTORS
1889-1949 ___ literary political people health love/sex self people Algeria Congo

WEB TEXT LINKS
a few pages
etext
about and some extracts

ORIGINAL MANUSCRIPT LINKS

SOME PUBLISHED TITLES
The Journals of Andre Gide

May 2005, June 2008, April 2013
Please email if you have any corrections, additions or comments, or if you've found the site useful. Thank you.

IMPORTANT NOTES AND CAUTIONS: 1) The first line of basic information may be incomplete in several ways: some historical figures have different names (titles, pen-names); their birth and death dates may be unknown or uncertain (g - guess, c - circa); similarly, their occupations may be unknown, or they may have had other jobs; and, for early diarists, I've used 'British' a bit too freely. 2) The biographical summary may not be accurate. It was compiled quickly from various sources, mostly on the internet, and the facts were not checked anywhere near as rigorously as they would have been if they'd been intended for publication in a printed form. 3) The journal dates and descriptors (which are in no particular order) must be treated with caution: since I have not examined the diaries myself, the descriptors are only guesses based on bibliographies, anthologies and internet biographies. 4) For the biography and etext links, I have ignored any sites with charges, and I have avoided, wherever possible, those with pop-ups or too much advertising. I have limited myself to providing three etext links where there is some variety between them. 5) For the original manuscript links, I have limited myself to providing a maximum of two (although, for a few diarists, their original diaries are held in more than two places). 6) I have provided the titles - chosen randomly - for up to three printed editions of the diaries.