Maurice Sachs

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Maurice Sachs (born Maurice Ettinghausen, 1906, Paris - April 14, 1945, Germany) was a French writer. He was the son of a Jewish family of jewelers.

Contents

[edit] Biography

Sachs was educated in an English-style boarding-school, lived for a year in London and worked in a bookshop, and returned to Paris.[1]

In 1925 he converted to Catholicism and decided to become a priest, though this didn't last upon meeting a young man on the beach at Juan-les-Pins.

After involvement in a number of dubious business activities, he traveled to New York, where he passed himself off as an art dealer. Returning to Paris, he associated himself with leading homosexual writers of the time - Cocteau, Gide and Max Jacob - with all of whom he had stormy relationships whose precise nature is unclear. At various times he worked for Jean Cocteau and Coco Chanel, in both cases stealing from them.

Sachs was mobilized at the start of World War II, but was discharged for sexual misconduct. During the early years of the Occupation, he made money out of helping Jewish families escape to the Unoccupied Zone. He may also have been an informer for the Gestapo. He was later imprisoned in Fuhlsbüttel.

[edit] Death

One story of Sachs' death is that he was lynched by other prisoners and his body was thrown to the dogs.[2]

[edit] Works

  • Alias, 1935. ISBN B0000DQN60.
  • Au Temps du Boeuf sur le Toit, 1939 e 2005. ISBN 2-246-38822-8.
  • André Gide, 1936. ISBN B0000DQN0W.
  • Chronique joyeuse et scandaleuse (Joyous and Scandalous Chronicle), Corrêa, 1950. ISBN B0000DS4FF.
  • Correspondence, 1925-1939, Gallimard, Paris 2003 ISBN 2-07-073354-8.
  • Histoire de John Cooper d'Albany (The Story of John Cooper of Albany), Gallimard, Paris 1955. ISBN B0000DNJVG.
  • La décade de l'illusion (The Decade of Illusion), Gallimard, Paris 1950. ISBN B0000DL12G.
  • Le Sabbat. Souvenirs d'une jeunesse orageuse (The Sabbath. Memories of a Stormy Youth), Paris 1946. ISBN 2-07-028724-6.
  • La chasse à courre (The Hunt), Gallimard, Paris 1997 ISBN 2-07-040278-9.
  • Tableaux des moeurs de ce temps (Table of Manners of This Time), Gallimard, Paris 1954. ISBN B0000DL12I.

[edit] Trivia

A shot of the cover of Sachs's novel Abracadabra (1952) momentarily occupies the entire screen during a crucial episode of Breathless, a classic film by Jean-Luc Godard.

[edit] References

  1. ^ “Maurice Sachs”, AndrejKoymasky.com, 2003-06-23, <http://www.andrejkoymasky.com/liv/fam/bios1/sach2.html>. Retrieved on 2007-08-24 .
  2. ^ Monceau, Philippe & Du Dognon, André (1950), Le dernier sabbat de Maurice Sachs, Hambourg, 1943-1945, Amiot-Dumont .

[edit] External links

This article draws heavily on the fr:Maurice Sachs article in the French-language Wikipedia, which was accessed in the version of March 27, 2006.