Author Description

It has long been assumed that France was dominated by the political left wing and by Existentialism throughout the 1940s and 1950s. This is the first book to re-evaluate the impact of the vigorous and unrepentant right-wing cultural and literary movement during the postwar period. In this revealing study, the author concentrates on three neglected but significant writers who constitute the group known as 'Hussards': Roger Nimier, Antoine Blondin and Jacques Laurent. He offers a detailed analysis of the work of the 'Hussards' and others on the fringe of this iconoclastic group who aggressively (and sometimes violently) opposed Existentialism while adopting a tradition from the 1920s full of nostalgia for lost values. Students and scholars will find that this book fills an important gap in French literary and cultural history of the postwar period.