Le Vent Paraclet
Presentation copy inscribed by Tournier to Maurice and Suzanne Genevoix: “Pour Maurice et Suzanne Genevoix en souvenir d'une si bonne visite. Ce 13 mars 1979. Michel Tournier.”
The Wind Spirit (Le Vent Paraclet) takes its title from the divine breath that surrounded the apostles at Pentecost and allowed them to understand one another regardless of language. Michel Tournier’s purpose is clear: to give an account of his literary life, from his childhood in Saint-Germain-en-Laye to his retirement in a former presbytery in the Chevreuse valley, in a work halfway between autobiography and essay. Its six chapters interweave his own history with that of his books, chiefly the novels of his major trilogy (Vendredi ou les limbes du Pacifique, Le Roi des Aulnes, Les Météores).
A fine copy with distinguished provenance. In 1967 Maurice Genevoix had helped crown Tournier’s first novel, Vendredi ou les Limbes du Pacifique, with the Grand Prix de l’Académie Française, awarded by seven votes out of eleven, including that of Genevoix himself, a fierce champion of the book. The prize was usually reserved for an established novelist, yet here it went to a first novel whose mastery astonished critics. On 21 December 1967, the Académie’s permanent secretary delivered a speech praising “symbols that I shall not undertake to explain, for the narrator knows how to blur the trail, concealing myths and philosophical reflection beneath his taste for adventure and his naturalist’s eye.”
Suzanne Genevoix is named alongside her husband in the inscription; she was Genevoix’s second wife, whom he married in 1943 after being widowed. Following Genevoix’s death in 1980, she worked to secure recognition for his work, from the wartime pages of Ceux de 14 to his naturalist and environmentally engaged writing. She continued this task, together with her daughter Sylvie, until her death in 2012, at the age of 101.