Boris Vian

Boris Vian was a French writer, musician, and actor. He was born to an upper-middle-class family in a suburb of Paris and studied math, philosophy, and languages while immersing himself in France’s jazz scene. He wrote his first novel in 1943, but his early work sold poorly. In 1946, he met philosophers and writers Jean-Paul Sarte, SImone de Beauvoir, and Albert Camus. Through his associations with such luminaries, Vian became more prominent and continued writing novels, poetry, and plays while playing the trumpet at the Le Tabou club in Paris.

Vian’s best-known play is The Empire Builders, an absurdist dark comedy first performed in 1957. His work was often dark and used invented words and a surrealistic plot. By 1955, Vian had stopped writing fiction and focused instead on songwriting, performing, and poetry. Like his novels, his songs were sometimes controversial. Vian died of sudden cardiac arrest at a screening of a film version of his novel I Shall Spit on Your Graves in 1959. His writing and music became more popular and successful in France after his death.