Pierre Daninos (26 May 1913 – 7 January 2005) was a French writer and humorist.

Life

Daninos was born in

Paris Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, largest city of France. With an estimated population of 2,048,472 residents in January 2025 in an area of more than , Paris is the List of ci ...

. He wrote ''Les carnets du Major Thompson'', which was published in 1954, and was followed by many sequels. The books in the series pretended to be the observations of a retired British officer living in France, and were witty collections of comparisons between French and British society. Daninos was also the author of ''Un Certain Monsieur Blot'', a critique of French middle class taste and habits. Some of these books were translated into English and published as ''Major Thompson Lives in France and Discovers the French'', ''Major Thompson and I'' and ''Major Thompson Goes French''. ''Les carnets du Major Thompson'' was filmed by

Preston Sturges Preston Sturges (; born Edmund Preston Biden; August 29, 1898 – August 6, 1959) was an American playwright, screenwriter, and film director. He is credited as being the first screenwriter to find success as a director. Prior to Sturges, other ...

in 1955. The film was released in the U.S. under the title '' The French, They Are a Funny Race''. These works were not praised by everyone. ''

The Guardian ''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in Manchester in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'' and changed its name in 1959, followed by a move to London. Along with its sister paper, ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardi ...

s obituary considered that this sort of thing had been done before and sometimes done better, and that Daninos had uncritically repeated instead of critically examining national stereotypes. Daninos was the brother of the industrialist Jean Daninos, who produced the

Facel Vega Facel S.A. was a French manufacturer of pressed steel automobile components and, subsequently, complete automobiles of their own design. To intensify its World War II war effort, French subcontracting company for military aeronautics Bronzavia ...

luxury cars. He died in Paris, aged 91.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Daninos, Pierre 1913 births 2005 deaths Writers from Paris 20th-century French novelists 21st-century French novelists Prix Interallié winners Lycée Janson-de-Sailly alumni Burials at Père Lachaise Cemetery French male novelists 20th-century French male writers 21st-century French male writers

Life

References

See also