Henri Ghéon (March 15, 1875 â€" June 13, 1944[1]), born Henri Vangeon
in Bray-sur-Seine, Seine-et-Marne, was a French playwright, novelist,
poet and critic.Brought up by a devout Roman Catholic mother, he lost
his faith in his early teens, while still at the Lycée in Sens. Among
the factors that brought this about, one stood out in his own mind: at
school religion was taught without life or understanding. Ghéon did
not miss it. As F. J. Sheed says, "His was a happy atheism."[2] He
replaced Catholicism with a semi-pagan cult of beauty in all its forms
â€" nature, literature, music, painting.He moved to Paris in 1893 to
study medicine. Around the same time, he started to write poetry,
along with his colleagues Francis Jammes and Stéphane Mallarmé. He
also published avant garde criticism. In 1887 he met André Gide, who
became his literary guide and friend for twenty years. Ghéon, writes
Gide's biographer Alan Sheridan, "was Gide's closest friend and
companion on innumerable homosexual exploits."[3] GhÄ—on actually
drafted a militant text in favour of homosexuality, La Vie secrète de
Guillaume Arnoult, which was one of the inspirations for Gide's
Corydon.[4] In 1909 they were founding members of the Nouvelle Revue
Française (NRF). Ghéon also painted, studied music and travelled
widely.It was the sceptic Gide who occasioned the first cracks in
Ghéon's paganism when he invited him to visit Florence with him in
1912. There Ghéon discovered the religious art of Giotto and Fra
Angelico and was overwhelmed to the point of shedding tears. "At St
Mark's," he wrote, "with Christ dying on the cross and the Virgin
waiting for the angel in a bare and silent corridor..., even our
senses had a soul. Art had transported me before, but never so
high."[5]
in Bray-sur-Seine, Seine-et-Marne, was a French playwright, novelist,
poet and critic.Brought up by a devout Roman Catholic mother, he lost
his faith in his early teens, while still at the Lycée in Sens. Among
the factors that brought this about, one stood out in his own mind: at
school religion was taught without life or understanding. Ghéon did
not miss it. As F. J. Sheed says, "His was a happy atheism."[2] He
replaced Catholicism with a semi-pagan cult of beauty in all its forms
â€" nature, literature, music, painting.He moved to Paris in 1893 to
study medicine. Around the same time, he started to write poetry,
along with his colleagues Francis Jammes and Stéphane Mallarmé. He
also published avant garde criticism. In 1887 he met André Gide, who
became his literary guide and friend for twenty years. Ghéon, writes
Gide's biographer Alan Sheridan, "was Gide's closest friend and
companion on innumerable homosexual exploits."[3] GhÄ—on actually
drafted a militant text in favour of homosexuality, La Vie secrète de
Guillaume Arnoult, which was one of the inspirations for Gide's
Corydon.[4] In 1909 they were founding members of the Nouvelle Revue
Française (NRF). Ghéon also painted, studied music and travelled
widely.It was the sceptic Gide who occasioned the first cracks in
Ghéon's paganism when he invited him to visit Florence with him in
1912. There Ghéon discovered the religious art of Giotto and Fra
Angelico and was overwhelmed to the point of shedding tears. "At St
Mark's," he wrote, "with Christ dying on the cross and the Virgin
waiting for the angel in a bare and silent corridor..., even our
senses had a soul. Art had transported me before, but never so
high."[5]
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