Francis Jammes(1868-1938)
- Writer
- Soundtrack
French poet and novelist Francis Jammes was born in Tourney, France, in 1868. He studied law at the University of Bordeaux, but upon the death of his father he dropped out of law school and moved in with his mother in the small Pyrenees village of Orthez, where he spent most of the rest of his life in seclusion (although he married in 1906 and fathered a total of seven children). Shortly before his death he moved to the nearby town of Hasparren. He was raised Catholic, but he wasn't a devoutly religious man, and in fact had basically given up on the Catholic religion until he met poet Paul Claudel, who eventually "re-converted" him back to Catholicism, and thereafter he identified himself as a "Catholic" poet.
His poems were basically paens to nature, and he became known as "the Henry David Thoreau of France"--one critic noted that Jammes loved nature and animals "better than any poet since the Greeks had loved them. They have rewarded him . . . by making him a poet". His novels and stories were mostly about simple rural people, and he was lauded for his sympathetic and sensitive characterizations of young girls.
He died in Hasparren, France, in 1938.
His poems were basically paens to nature, and he became known as "the Henry David Thoreau of France"--one critic noted that Jammes loved nature and animals "better than any poet since the Greeks had loved them. They have rewarded him . . . by making him a poet". His novels and stories were mostly about simple rural people, and he was lauded for his sympathetic and sensitive characterizations of young girls.
He died in Hasparren, France, in 1938.
