Emmanuel Bove (1898–1945)

Emmanuel Bove was born Emmanuel Bobovnikoff in Paris to a Jewish father who had emigrated to France from Ukraine and a Luxembourgish mother. He had a brother, Leon. Emmanuel studied at the Lycée Calvin in Geneva, Switzerland. In 1915, he was sent to boarding school in England, where he completed his education. Returning to Paris, he fell into extreme poverty and even served a month in prison for vagrancy. In 1921, he married Suzanne Vallois and moved to the suburbs of Vienna. There he began his literary career, publishing numerous popular novels under the pseudonym Jean Vallois. He went back to Paris again in 1922 and took work as a journalist and translator. His writing came to the attention of Colette, who helped him publish his first novel under his own name, Mes amis (My Friends) in 1924. The novel was a success and won the Prix Eugène Figuière in 1928.
In 1940, at the start of World War II, Bove was mobilized as a laborer. He was unable to publish during the Nazi Occupation of France, and managed to flee the country in 1942 to Algiers. There he wrote his three final novels: le Piège, Départ dans la nuit, and Non-lieu. Following the liberation of Paris, Bove returned once more but in poor health from illnesses caught during his exile. He died at age 47 on July 19, 1945.