Marie de Régnier
| Marie de Régnier | |
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Marie de Régnier in 1889, photographed by Paul Nadar
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| Born | Marie-Louise Antoinette de Heredia December 20, 1875 Paris |
| Died | February 6, 1963 (aged 87) Suresnes, France |
| Pen name | Gérard d'Houville |
| Occupation | Novelist, poet |
| Language | French |
| Nationality | French |
| Notable awards | Grand prix de littérature de l'Académie française, 1918 |
| Spouse | Henri de Régnier |
| Relatives | José-Maria de Heredia (father) |
Marie de Régnier (French: [maʁi də ʁeɲe]; 20 December 1875 – 6 February 1963), also known by her maiden name Marie de Heredia or her pen-name Gérard d'Houville (French: [ʒeʁaʁ duvil]), was a French novelist and poet, and closely involved in the artistic circles of early twentieth-century Paris.
Marie de Heredia was the second of three daughters of Cuban-born French poet José-Maria de Heredia, and from an early age she mixed with many writers and artists that came to her father's house, including Leconte de Lisle, Anna de Noailles, Paul Valéry, Pierre Louÿs and Anatole France.
Her private life was somewhat convoluted. She married poet Henri de Régnier, but had a long-term relationship with Pierre Louÿs, who was probably the father of her son Pierre de Régnier (1898-1943). She also took several other lovers, including Edmond Jaloux, Jean-Louis Vaudoyer, Gabriele D'Annunzio (during his exile in Paris from 1910 to 1914), and dramatist Henri Bernstein. Her association with openly-lesbian colleagues also led to rumours about her own sexuality.
Though sometimes better known for her liaisons with other artists, Marie de Régnier was a very accomplished poet and novelist in her own right, "considered one of the most gifted of the bevy of women writers that her age produced". Her first attempts at poetry were written at the Bibliothèque de l'Arsenal, where her father was a director. He and his friends encouraged her talents from a very young age, and she eventually began publishing under her married name, later taking the masculine-sounding pseudonym "Gérard d'Houville" (derived from the name of a Norman grandmother, "Louise Gérard d'Houville" or "Girard d'Ouville"). She later said her use of a pen-name was a way of distancing herself from her more famous husband and father, but it was not a serious attempt to disguise her sex: contemporary critics and commentators always referred to "Madame" Gérard d'Houville.
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