Pierre Veber

Pierre-Eugène Veber (15 May 1869, in Paris – 1942) was a French playwright and writer.

Pierre Veber was the brother of the painter Jean Veber, and the brother-in-law of both René Doumic and Tristan Bernard. His family was quite large, as he himself points out in the preface to the book X… Roman Impromptu: “If seventy cities vie for the honour of having given birth to me, it’s not because I’m ten times more famous than Homer, but simply because the name I bear is more common.” At the time, there were several authors and scriptwriters with the same surname, such as Jean-Pierre Veber and Serge Veber; with whom Pierre worked from time to time.

Pierre Veber is the father of journalist and author Pierre-Gilles Veber, and of screenwriter Serge Veber. He is also the grandfather of screenwriter and film director Francis Veber, and the great-grandfather of author Sophie Audouin-Mamikonian.

Little is known about his youth. He himself explained: “My studies were quite limited, of which I am not proud.” By 1889, his work had already been published in the literary periodical Gil Blas, as André Antoine says in his journal entry from 25: “This evening, Rue Blanche, we are being visited by two newcomers, Tristan Bernard and Pierre Veber, two young journalists of great intellect who, each week, write for Gil Blas, a news magazine illustrated by Jean Veber.” In 1892, Pierre Veber contributed to the magazine Le Chasseur de Chevelures (The Hunter of Locks), under the guidance of Tristan Bernard. This humorous newspaper had only two issues, in 1892 and 1893, and in the latter year Pierre Veber was credited as co-author in the statement: “Tristan Bernard: honest editor; Pierre Veber: corrupt editor.”

Pierre Veber was a prolific writer, who, with a forty-year long career, produced around one hundred slapstick comedies, vaudevilles, opera libretti; and nearly fifty novels and collections of short stories, along with tales both humorous and ironic. Nearly half of his plays were written in collaboration with one or two other authors, to whom he brought his great elegance and ease of writing, which he admitted with humour in the preface to his Théâtre Incomplet: “The theatre is, for a writer, a delightful distraction which allows a break to be taken from writing. We listen to domesticated fools who ramble on; we note down their remarks; we imagine their gestures. And that makes the play.”

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