Writing

Michel Butor

Michel Butor (14 September 1926 – 24 August 2016) was a French poet, novelist, teacher, essayist, art critic and translator. Michel Marie François Butor was born in Mons-en-Barœul, a suburb of Lille, the third of seven children. His parents were Émile Butor (1891–1960), a railroad inspector and Anna (née Brajeux, 1896–1972). He studied philosophy at the Sorbonne, graduating in 1947. He taught in Egypt, Manchester, Thessaloniki, the United States, and Geneva. He won many literary awards for his work, including the Prix Fénéon and the Prix Renaudot. Journalists and critics have associated his novels with the nouveau roman, but Butor himself long resisted that association. The main point of similarity is a very general one, not much beyond that; like exponents of the nouveau roman, he can be described as an experimental writer. His best-known novel, La Modification, for instance, is written entirely in the second person. In his 1967 La critique et l'invention, he famously said that even the most literal quotation is already a kind of parody because of its "trans-contextualization."