Hervé Le Tellier


Hervé Le Tellier is a French writer and linguist, and a member of the international literary group Oulipo. He is its fourth president. Other notable members have included Raymond Queneau, Georges Perec, Italo Calvino, Jacques Roubaud, Jean Lescure and Harry Mathews.

Biography

Born in Paris, Le Tellier started his career as a scientific journalist, and joined Oulipo in 1992. As an author, he came to general attention in 1998 with the publication in France of his book Les amnésiques n'ont rien vécu d'inoubliable, a collection of one thousand very short sentences all beginning with "Je pense que", published in English as A Thousand Pearls . His rather complex novel Le voleur de nostalgie is a tribute to the Italian writer Italo Calvino. He is also one of the Papous dans la tête, the cult literary quiz of France Culture, the French cultural radio station.
He became in 2002 a daily contributor to the website of the newspaper Le Monde with a short satirical chronicle called Papier de verre.
He founded, with Frederic Pages and others, the "Association of Friends of Jean-Baptiste Botul" to promote this fictitious philosopher and his school of "Botulism".
One of his most recent publication is Esthétique de l’Oulipo, a very personal take on literature under constraint, considered from a linguistic perspective.
Seven of his books are translated into English, from Enough about love to The Sextine Chapel.

His books