Biography for
Jean Genet (I) More at IMDbPro »

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Mini Biography

Social outcast and criminal who became a novelist and dramatist. Jean-Paul Sartre likened Genet to a saint!

Mini Biography

Sartre likens Genet to a saint for a very particular reason, a reason which is apparent in the title of the biography, but which does not translate in the English title--"Saint Genet: Actor and Martyr"--meaning and referentiality are lost. The French title is: "Saint Genet: Comédien et Martyr"; 'Saint Genet' evokes the memory of St. Genestus (known in Fr. as Genest or Genêt), the 3rd-century Roman actor and martyr and the patron saint of actors. Also, the word 'comédien' ('actor' not necessarily 'comic') is used in everyday language to designate a person who shams or 'puts on an act'. Thus, the title itself gives one more of an impression of the author in question than it would seem on the surface. Incidentally, Genet was saved from further imprisonment by the intervention of Jean Cocteau, the famous writer, film maker, and artist who, on the basis of Genet's first poem, declared him a literary genius. Genet, while in prison, would steal paper from the prison workshop on which he would then write his poems and stories. He was also a playwright. There is a second biography of him know written by the famous gay novelist, Edmund White. Jean Genet was himself gay, and thus the controversies over various of his works in America...all of which were non-issues in France and Europe at large.

Trivia

Buried in the Spanish Cemetery in Larache, Morocco. His tomb there is used as a location in _Tarik el Hob (2001)_.

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