Jean Genet: The Autobiographical Works

Abstract

Jean Genet (1910–86) was deserted by his mother soon after his birth. He was brought up by peasant foster parents and orphanages, before being sent to Mettray Reformatory at the age of ten. After leaving Mettray, he joined the French Foreign Legion, from which he deserted to follow a career of theft and prostitution across most European cities during the 1930s, punctuated by frequent terms of imprisonment. At Fresnes prison, in France, he wrote his first novel Our Lady of the Flowers (the first complete version was discovered and destroyed by the authorities; he calmly wrote the book again) and was sufficiently well known as a writer by 1947 to be the subject of a successful petition to the French President (supported by Jean Cocteau and Jean-Paul Sartre) for Genet’s release, despite his having recently been sentenced for theft for the eleventh time in France, and having received a life sentence.