Colette (pronounced: [kɔ.lɛt]) was the surname of the French novelist and performer Sidonie-Gabrielle Colette (28 January 1873 – 3 August 1954). She is best known for her novel Gigi, upon which Lerner and Loewe based the stage and film musical comedies of the same title.
Colette was born to retired military officer Jules-Joseph Colette and his wife Adèle Eugénie Sidonie "Sido" Colette (nėe Landoy) in Saint-Sauveur-en-Puisaye, Yonne, in the Burgun...
More
Colette (pronounced: [kɔ.lɛt]) was the surname of the French novelist and performer Sidonie-Gabrielle Colette (28 January 1873 – 3 August 1954). She is best known for her novel Gigi, upon which Lerner and Loewe based the stage and film musical comedies of the same title.
Colette was born to retired military officer Jules-Joseph Colette and his wife Adèle Eugénie Sidonie "Sido" Colette (nėe Landoy) in Saint-Sauveur-en-Puisaye, Yonne, in the Burgundy Region of France. She studied piano as a child and received her primary school diploma with high marks in mathematics and dictation. In 1893, at age 20, she married Henri Gauthier-Villars, a famous wit known as "Willy", who was 15 years her senior.
Her first books, the Claudine series, were published under the pen name of her husband, "Willy", writer, music critic, "literary charlatan and degenerate". Claudine still has the power to charm; in belle epoque France it was downright shocking, much to Willy's satisfaction and profit.
In 1906,...
Less
