Marcel Allain (15 September 1885 – 25 August 1969) was a French

writer A writer is a person who uses written words in different writing styles and techniques to communicate ideas. Writers produce different forms of literary art and creative writing such as novels, short stories, books, poetry, travelogues, pla ...

mostly remembered today for his co-creation with Pierre Souvestre of the

fictional Fiction is any creative work, chiefly any narrative work, portraying individuals, events, or places that are imaginary, or in ways that are imaginary. Fictional portrayals are thus inconsistent with history, fact, or plausibility. In a traditio ...

arch-

villain A villain (also known as a "black hat" or "bad guy"; the feminine form is villainess) is a stock character, whether based on a historical narrative or one of literary fiction. ''Random House Unabridged Dictionary'' defines such a character a ...

and master

criminal In ordinary language, a crime is an unlawful act punishable by a state or other authority. The term ''crime'' does not, in modern criminal law, have any simple and universally accepted definition,Farmer, Lindsay: "Crime, definitions of", in Ca ...

Fantômas.

Career

The son of a bourgeois family, Allain studied

law Law is a set of rules that are created and are enforceable by social or governmental institutions to regulate behavior,Robertson, ''Crimes against humanity'', 90. with its precise definition a matter of longstanding debate. It has been vari ...

before becoming a

journalist A journalist is an individual that collects/gathers information in form of text, audio, or pictures, processes them into a news-worthy form, and disseminates it to the public. The act or process mainly done by the journalist is called journalism ...

. He then became the assistant of Souvestre, who was already a well-known figure in literary circles. In 1909, the two men published their first novel, ''Le Rour''. Investigating Magistrate Germain Fuselier, later to become a recurring character in the Fantômas series, appears in the novel. Then, in February 1911, Allain and Souvestre embarked upon the ''Fantômas''

book series A book series is a sequence of books having certain characteristics in common that are formally identified together as a group. Book series can be organized in different ways, such as written by the same author, or marketed as a group by their pub ...

at the request of publisher Arthème Fayard, who wanted to create a new monthly

pulp magazine Pulp magazines (also referred to as "the pulps") were inexpensive fiction magazines that were published from 1896 to the late 1950s. The term "pulp" derives from the cheap wood pulp paper on which the magazines were printed. In contrast, magazin ...

. The success was immediate and lasting. After Souvestre’s death in February 1914, Allain continued the ''Fantômas'' saga alone, then launched several other series, such as ''

Tigris The Tigris () is the easternmost of the two great rivers that define Mesopotamia, the other being the Euphrates. The river flows south from the mountains of the Armenian Highlands through the Syrian and Arabian Deserts, and empties into the ...

'', '' Fatala'', '' Miss Téria'' and '' Férocias'', but none garnered the same popularity as ''Fantômas''. In total, Allain wrote more than 400 novels in his prolific career. On 27 September 1926, Allain married Souvestre’s girl-friend, Henriette Kistler. She died in 1956.

Other work by Allain and Souvestre

* ''Le Rour'' (1908)

Bibliography of the Fantômas books

By Allain and Souvestre

;1911 * 1. ''Fantômas'' (1911; transl. 1915; retransl. 1986) * 2. ''Juve contre Fantômas'' (1911; transl. 1916; retransl. 1987) * 3. ''Le Mort qui Tue'' (1911; transl. 1917) * 4. ''L'Agent Secret'' (1911; transl. 1917) * 5. ''Un Roi Prisonnier de Fantômas'' (1911; transl. 1919) * 6. ''Le Policier Apache'' (1911; transl. 1924) * 7. ''Le Pendu de Londres'' (1911; transl. 1920) * 8. ''La Fille de Fantômas'' (1911; transl. 2006) () * 9. ''Le Fiacre de Nuit'' (1911) * 10. ''La Main Coupée'' (1911; transl. 1924) ;1912 * 11. ''L'Arrestation de Fantômas'' (1912) * 13. ''La Livrée du Crime'' (1912) * 14. ''La Mort de Juve'' (1912) * 15. ''L'Evadée de Saint-Lazare'' (1912) * 16. ''La Disparition de Fandor'' (1912) * 17. ''Le Mariage de Fantômas'' (1912) * 18. ''L'Assassin de Lady Beltham'' (1912) * 19. ''La Guêpe Rouge'' (1912) * 20. ''Les Souliers du Mort'' (1912) * 21. ''Le Train Perdu'' (1912) * 22. ''Les Amours d'un Prince'' (1912) * 23. ''Le Bouquet Tragique'' (1912) ;1913 * 24. ''Le Jockey Masqué'' (1913) * 25. ''Le Cercueil Vide'' (1913) * 26. ''Le Faiseur de Reines'' (1913) * 27. ''Le Cadavre Géant'' (1913) * 28. ''Le Voleur d'Or'' (1913) * 29. ''La Série Rouge'' (1913) * 30. ''L'Hôtel du Crime'' (1913) * 31. ''La Cravate de Chanvre'' (1913) * 32. ''La Fin de Fantômas'' (1913)

By Allain alone

* 33. ''Fantômas est-il ressuscité?'' (1925; transl. 1925) * 34. ''Fantômas, Roi des Recéleurs'' (1926; transl. 1926) * 35. ''Fantômas en Danger'' (1926; transl. 1926) * 36. ''Fantômas prend sa Revanche'' (1926; transl. 1927) * 37. ''Fantômas Attaque Fandor'' (1926; transl. 1928) * 38. ''Si c'était Fantômas?'' (1933) * 39. ''Oui, c'est Fantômas!'' (1934) * 40. ''Fantômas Joue et Gagne'' (1935) * 41. ''Fantômas Rencontre l'Amour'' (1946) * 42. ''Fantômas Vole des Blondes'' (1948) * 43. ''Fantômas Mène le Bal'' (1963)

References

External links

* * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Allain, Marcel 1885 births 1969 deaths Writers from Paris 20th-century French novelists 20th-century French male writers French crime fiction writers French fantasy writers French male novelists French male non-fiction writers 20th-century French journalists