Beno卯t Duteurtre (20 March 1960 鈥� 16 July 2024) was a French novelist and essayist. He was also a musical critic, musician, producer and host of a radio show about music. He spent his time between Paris, New York and Normandy.
Beno卯t Duteurtre was born in Sainte-Adresse, Seine-Maritime, Upper Normandy, where he spent his first years. He was the son of Jean-Claude Duteurtre and Marie-Claire Georges. He was also the great-grandson of the French president Ren茅 Coty. He attended Saint-Joseph, a Catholic educational institution in Le Havre. Duteurtre began to write at an early age. At fifteen, he presented his first texts to Armand Salacrou, a French dramatist established in Le Havre, who encouraged him to pursue his efforts. Le Havre, a heavily destroyed city during World War II and rebuilt in the structural classicism style will often reappear in Duteurtre's later works.
At the age of sixteen, Beno卯t Duteurtre was fascinated with modern music, especially the work of Pierre Boulez. In 1977, Beno卯t began musicology studies at the University of Rouen, France. That same year, he met Karlheinz Stockhausen and, a year later, Iannis Xenakis. In 1979, Beno卯t Duteurtre studied for a month with Gy枚rgy Ligeti, whose musical theory later had a strong influence in his life. He graduated with a license in Musicology.
as a smoker of french descent who doesn't like children and has never seen an episode of american idol - and does not understand its appeal - this book felt tailor-made for me. it's not perfect, but it made me nod several times and say "i know, right??" to absolutely no one thus reinforcing my reputation as a crazy curmudgeon.
The story follows a man whose only fault is being brilliant as he is being presecuted for the same reason. That's what he thinks. In reality, he's a giant manchild with irrational hate towards (surprise!) children. No mentally healthy middle-aged man feels acccomplished after yelling obscenities at children, but throughout the entire book the author is presenting this poor excuse of a main character as the only reasonable one. The black man is a dumb pothead, the woman is incompetent and (man this book is full of surprises!) dumb, and white, middle-aged and straight man is opressed.
Seriously, do yourself a favour and don't read this shitfest.
I totally loved this book. Because I hate children and I love Marlboro. And I really hope such thing won't happen while I'm living. I would be acting same as main character.
I was speaking about this book on my literature exam and I know teachers gave me lower mark than I was worth because I put this book in 3rd place as my best books I have ever read. It was really unfair that I got lower mark because of my opinion... This book gave me so many emotions. It was strange to read and understand, but I loved it any way. I loved the way main character described his hate of children. I agree with him on 100%. And I started smoking that year I read this book, so of course it was even more amazing. Children shouldn't ruin life of adults. We are adults so we can do whatever we like: we can smoke, drink, kill ourselves, swear, fight- it is life of adults and children should go and play somewhere away from real world.
In fact I don't know why I bought this book. I simply found it in shop, I was bored and it's cover attracted me because it was made like pack of cigarettes and I thought: "Now this looks interesting. I must buy it.". I didn't expect such unpopular and forgotten book in shop to be so touching my heart. I love all books that show my view to world. And this was one of them.