PARIS, July 31 (AFP) - European zoo authorities say they plan to set up an international database to register animals that are being stolen in growing numbers to feed demand from private collectors and unscrupulous dealers in the exotic pet trade.
The call for a Europe-wide computerised inventory follows a spate of thefts of animals in France over the last year including flamingoes, parrots, wallabies, monkeys, birds of prey and even penguins.
In 2004 several British zoos were targeted by thieves looking for small monkeys such as marmosets and tamarinds. Some 40 animals were taken before the break-ins abruptly stopped -- giving rise to speculation that the criminals were filling an order from an anonymous mastermind.
Statistics due out next week from the Amsterdam-based European Association of Zoos and Aquaria (EAZA) are expected to confirm that zoo thefts are an increasing concern among its 290 members in 34 countries in Europe and the Middle East.
"This is the first time we have carried out a comprehensive survey, and it's in response to growing awareness that this is an international phenomenon. There is clearly a need for a permanent database to keep tabs on cross-border trafficking," said EAZA director Koen Brouwer.
In one recent theft in northeast France, 12 pink flamingoes were taken from the Amneville zoo by intruders who broke in at night using heavy wire-cutters and then tore off the roof of the birds' hut.
"What makes me angry is not the financial loss but the damage to the animals," said the zoo's owner Michel Louis.
"It is inconceivable that some of the birds did not break a leg or suffer heart failure because of the shock of the experience. We think that the thieves get an order for a certain number of animals, but take many more because they know some will die."
Fourteen pink flamingoes were also taken from Amiens zoo in June in what zoo director Christine Morrier said was certainly a commissioned theft.
"Right next to them were rare species like Humboldt penguins, but the thieves left them alone. I reckon the birds were taken out of the country straightaway," she said.
At the Beauval animal park in central France the theft of three wallabies and a marmoset in May came after the loss of a vulture and several parrots; the Sables d'Olonne zoo was relieved of two penguins; Thoiry lost five pygmy marmosets; and parrots and monkeys were taken from Aix-en-Provence.
Zoo officials and police agree that the thefts are motivated by the high prices offered for exotic breeds on the black market. A flamingo can sell for up to 3,000 euros (3,600 dollars), and a tamarind for up to 7,000 euros. The tiny Madagascar tortoise can fetch 10,000 euros.
Since the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES) came into effect 30 years ago, it is against the law for European dealers to import animals caught in the wild.
In recent years customs officials have become increasingly active against the trade -- which has made zoos an obvious next target.
"It is so much easier to nick a parrot in a French zoo - and it's a lot cheaper to carry off. No plane ticket, no intermediaries, no-one to bribe. And the collectors are more and more numerous with more and more exotic demands," said Louis.
"The illegal trade in exotic animals is just like the one in arts and antiques.
There are relatively few operators but they are real specialists," said John Hayward, British coordinator of the National Theft Register for Exotic Animals.
"I wouldn't want to climb into a monkey-house if I didn't know exactly what I was doing. You can end up being badly bitten or coming away with the wrong species," he said.
Britain is the only country in Europe to maintain a database of stolen zoo animals, and Hayward has offered to help the EAZA to set up a pan-European version. In addition to the 40 small monkeys stolen last year, the most common thefts in Britain are of cockatoos and macaws, rare tortoises and koy carp.
"The motive is either to feed into the local or international pet trade, or for breeding -- a clutch of rare tortoise eggs could make you very rich -- or to answer the call of someone with a lot of money. The Mona Lisa for these collectors is the hyacinth macaw, which can get 10,000 pounds (15,000 euros)," he said.
Greater international coordination between police and zoo authorities is required to stop the thefts, said Hayward, but so is tighter security in zoos. Most are now aware of the danger and many have installed cameras, alarms and nightwatchmen.
In addition zoo owners are being urged to identify all animals with microchips and to take photographs.
"They may all look alike to the untrained eye, but every animal has some distinguishing feature like a spot on a beak or a twisted toe. A picture can make all the difference in an investigation," said Hayward.
Sunday, July 31, 2005
US scientists announce discovery of possible '10th planet'
If confirmed, the discovery by Mike Brown of the respected California Institute of Technology would be the first of a planet since Pluto was identified in 1930 and shatter the notion that nine planets circle the sun.
"Get out your pens. Start re-writing textbooks today," said Brown, a professor of planetary astronomy, announcing what he called "the 10th planet of the solar system," one that is larger than Pluto.
"It's the farthest object ever discovered to orbit around the sun," Brown said in a conference call of the planet that is covered in methane ice and lies nearly 15 billion kilometers (nine billion miles) from Earth.
"I'd say it's probably one and a half times the size of Pluto," he said from CalTech, based in Pasadena, near Los Angeles, referring to what until now has been the most distant planet in earth's solar system.
Currently about 97 times further from the sun than the Earth, the celestial body tentatively called "2003-UB313" is the farthest known object in the solar system, and the third brightest of the Kuiper belt objects.
It is a typical member of the Kuiper belt, but its sheer size in relation to the nine known planets means that it can only be classified as a planet, Brown said.
The astronomer conceded he and his team did not know the exact size of the new planet, but its brightness and distance tell them that it is at least as large as Pluto, which measures 2,302 kilometers (1,438 miles) in diameter.
The size of an object in the solar system object can be inferred by its brightness, just as the size of a faraway light bulb can be calculated if one knows its wattage, he explained.
"We are 100 percent confident that this is the first object bigger than Pluto ever found in the outer solar system."
But Brown conceded that the discovery would likely rekindle debate over the definition of the term "planet" and whether Pluto should still be regarded as one.
Critics have long questioned whether Pluto, which resembles objects in the Kuiper belt, is actually a planet.
Brown discovered what could be a new addition to the universe known to man along with colleagues Chad Trujillo, of the Gemini Observatory in Mauna Kea, Hawaii, and David Rabinowitz, of Yale University, on January 8.
The planet was first spotted on October 31, 2003 with the Samuel Oschin Telescope at Palomar Observatory near San Diego, California.
But it was so far away that its motion was not detected until the scientists reanalysed the data earlier this year, Brown said.
The astronomers have proposed a name for the "planet" to the science's governing body, the International Astronomical Union, and are awaiting the decision of this body before announcing it.
The planet has not been noticed previously because its orbit is at a 45 degree angle to the rest of the solar system, he said.
"We found it because we've looked everywhere else. Nobody looks way up that high. It's tilted way out of plane," he added.
The new planet, which Brown said looks very much like Pluto, will be visible over the next six months and is currently almost directly overhead in the early-morning eastern sky, in the Cetus constellation.
News of the discovery was announced earlier than expected after hackers broke into Brown's website and stole news of it, he charged.
The team had planned to keep the news secret until their research was completed, but a Spanish team said Thursday it had identified a large, bright object in the Kuiper belt surrounding the solar system.
Brown said "somebody with more cleverness than scruples" had uncovered what had been under wraps: that astronomers had discovered 2003-UB313 as well as another bright object in the Kuiper belt, forcing a public announcement.
The announcement, resulting from a study partially funded by NASA, ironically came two days after the US space agency grounded its space shuttle fleet, after a piece of foam insulation broke off a fuel tank of the Discovery on lift-off earlier this week.
The same problem led to the disintegration of the last shuttle to blast into space in 2003, killing seven astronauts.
A US astronomer said Friday he had discovered a 10th planet in the outer reaches of the solar system that could force scientists to redraw the astronomical map.
"Get out your pens. Start re-writing textbooks today," said Brown, a professor of planetary astronomy, announcing what he called "the 10th planet of the solar system," one that is larger than Pluto.
"It's the farthest object ever discovered to orbit around the sun," Brown said in a conference call of the planet that is covered in methane ice and lies nearly 15 billion kilometers (nine billion miles) from Earth.
"I'd say it's probably one and a half times the size of Pluto," he said from CalTech, based in Pasadena, near Los Angeles, referring to what until now has been the most distant planet in earth's solar system.
Currently about 97 times further from the sun than the Earth, the celestial body tentatively called "2003-UB313" is the farthest known object in the solar system, and the third brightest of the Kuiper belt objects.
It is a typical member of the Kuiper belt, but its sheer size in relation to the nine known planets means that it can only be classified as a planet, Brown said.
The astronomer conceded he and his team did not know the exact size of the new planet, but its brightness and distance tell them that it is at least as large as Pluto, which measures 2,302 kilometers (1,438 miles) in diameter.
The size of an object in the solar system object can be inferred by its brightness, just as the size of a faraway light bulb can be calculated if one knows its wattage, he explained.
"We are 100 percent confident that this is the first object bigger than Pluto ever found in the outer solar system."
But Brown conceded that the discovery would likely rekindle debate over the definition of the term "planet" and whether Pluto should still be regarded as one.
Critics have long questioned whether Pluto, which resembles objects in the Kuiper belt, is actually a planet.
Brown discovered what could be a new addition to the universe known to man along with colleagues Chad Trujillo, of the Gemini Observatory in Mauna Kea, Hawaii, and David Rabinowitz, of Yale University, on January 8.
The planet was first spotted on October 31, 2003 with the Samuel Oschin Telescope at Palomar Observatory near San Diego, California.
But it was so far away that its motion was not detected until the scientists reanalysed the data earlier this year, Brown said.
The astronomers have proposed a name for the "planet" to the science's governing body, the International Astronomical Union, and are awaiting the decision of this body before announcing it.
The planet has not been noticed previously because its orbit is at a 45 degree angle to the rest of the solar system, he said.
"We found it because we've looked everywhere else. Nobody looks way up that high. It's tilted way out of plane," he added.
The new planet, which Brown said looks very much like Pluto, will be visible over the next six months and is currently almost directly overhead in the early-morning eastern sky, in the Cetus constellation.
News of the discovery was announced earlier than expected after hackers broke into Brown's website and stole news of it, he charged.
The team had planned to keep the news secret until their research was completed, but a Spanish team said Thursday it had identified a large, bright object in the Kuiper belt surrounding the solar system.
Brown said "somebody with more cleverness than scruples" had uncovered what had been under wraps: that astronomers had discovered 2003-UB313 as well as another bright object in the Kuiper belt, forcing a public announcement.
The announcement, resulting from a study partially funded by NASA, ironically came two days after the US space agency grounded its space shuttle fleet, after a piece of foam insulation broke off a fuel tank of the Discovery on lift-off earlier this week.
The same problem led to the disintegration of the last shuttle to blast into space in 2003, killing seven astronauts.
A US astronomer said Friday he had discovered a 10th planet in the outer reaches of the solar system that could force scientists to redraw the astronomical map.
Dinosaur Embryos Reveal 'Ridiculous' Proportions
The oldest fossilized dinosaur embryos ever found reveal how the creatures grew from tiny hatchlings to become such giant land beasts.
The embryos, including one that was ready to hatch before being frozen in time, had no teeth. That is further evidence that at least some dinosaurs must have tended their young, scientists said today.
The embryos are 190 million years, dating from the beginning of the Jurassic Period.
"Most dinosaur embryos are from the Cretaceous period (146 to 65 millions years ago)," said biologist Robert Reisz of the University of Toronto at Mississauga. "The work on the embryo, its identification, and the fact we can see the detailed anatomy of the earliest known dinosaur embryo is extremely exciting."
'Ridiculous' proportions
The dinosaur is called Massospondylus. It was common in what is now South Africa.
A typical adult Massospondylus was 16 feet (5 meters) long. The best-preserved egg is just 2.4 inches (6 cm) long. The embryo, curled up inside, is about 6 inches (15 cm) in length.
An analysis of the embryos suggests they were born walking on four legs with short tails, long forelimbs and big heads. To morph into their adult shape -- walking on two legs with long tails, short forelimbs and small heads -- their various features must have grown at different rates.
"The proportions are just ridiculous," Reisz said.
There are no other examples of such well preserved embryos combined with adult skeletons among dinosaurs, Reisz said.
The lack of embryonic teeth points to hatchlings that could not possibly have fended for themselves.
"These embryos, which were clearly ready to hatch, had overall awkward body proportions and no mechanism for feeding themselves, which suggest they required parental care," said Reisz, who led the investigation. "If this interpretation is correct, we have here the oldest known indication of parental care in the fossil record."
More impications
The embryos were found in 1978 but only recently have they been exposed from the rock in which they were embedded. The results of the study are detailed in the July 29 issue of the journal Science.
The fossils are in fact the oldest examples of terrestrial vertebrate embryos.
The research indicates how larger dinosaurs later in the fossil record might have come about.
Massospondylus was a prosauropod. The group is thought to have later evolved to include giant sauropods that walked on four legs, including the gargantuan Seismosaurus.
Scientists once thought the group walked only on two legs, then simply dropped to four when they evolved into heavier beasts. But the new findings may challenge that assumption by showing that even prosauropods had some tendency to walk on four legs.
"Because the embryo of Massospondylus looks like a tiny sauropod with massive limbs and a quadrupedal gait," Reisz and his colleagues speculate that "the sauropod's gait probably evolved" by a process in which features present in an embryo and juvenile gradually become predominant in adults later in the evolutionary timeline.
"This would be significant because it means we might have to re-evaluate the origin of many features in sauropod skeletons we assumed had to do with weight support," said Western Illinois University researcher Matthew Bonnan in a separate article in the journal.
Birds of Prey: See Today's Dinosaurs
Avian Ancestors: Dinosaurs that Learned to Fly
Visit LiveScience.com for more daily news, views and scientific inquiry with an original, provocative point of view. LiveScience reports amazing, real world breakthroughs, made simple and stimulating for people on the go. Check out our collection of Amazing Images, Image Galleries, Interactive Features, Trivia and more. Sign up for our free daily email newsletter today!
Robert Roy Britt
LiveScience Senior Writer
LiveScience.com
The embryos, including one that was ready to hatch before being frozen in time, had no teeth. That is further evidence that at least some dinosaurs must have tended their young, scientists said today.
The embryos are 190 million years, dating from the beginning of the Jurassic Period.
"Most dinosaur embryos are from the Cretaceous period (146 to 65 millions years ago)," said biologist Robert Reisz of the University of Toronto at Mississauga. "The work on the embryo, its identification, and the fact we can see the detailed anatomy of the earliest known dinosaur embryo is extremely exciting."
'Ridiculous' proportions
The dinosaur is called Massospondylus. It was common in what is now South Africa.
A typical adult Massospondylus was 16 feet (5 meters) long. The best-preserved egg is just 2.4 inches (6 cm) long. The embryo, curled up inside, is about 6 inches (15 cm) in length.
An analysis of the embryos suggests they were born walking on four legs with short tails, long forelimbs and big heads. To morph into their adult shape -- walking on two legs with long tails, short forelimbs and small heads -- their various features must have grown at different rates.
"The proportions are just ridiculous," Reisz said.
There are no other examples of such well preserved embryos combined with adult skeletons among dinosaurs, Reisz said.
The lack of embryonic teeth points to hatchlings that could not possibly have fended for themselves.
"These embryos, which were clearly ready to hatch, had overall awkward body proportions and no mechanism for feeding themselves, which suggest they required parental care," said Reisz, who led the investigation. "If this interpretation is correct, we have here the oldest known indication of parental care in the fossil record."
More impications
The embryos were found in 1978 but only recently have they been exposed from the rock in which they were embedded. The results of the study are detailed in the July 29 issue of the journal Science.
The fossils are in fact the oldest examples of terrestrial vertebrate embryos.
The research indicates how larger dinosaurs later in the fossil record might have come about.
Massospondylus was a prosauropod. The group is thought to have later evolved to include giant sauropods that walked on four legs, including the gargantuan Seismosaurus.
Scientists once thought the group walked only on two legs, then simply dropped to four when they evolved into heavier beasts. But the new findings may challenge that assumption by showing that even prosauropods had some tendency to walk on four legs.
"Because the embryo of Massospondylus looks like a tiny sauropod with massive limbs and a quadrupedal gait," Reisz and his colleagues speculate that "the sauropod's gait probably evolved" by a process in which features present in an embryo and juvenile gradually become predominant in adults later in the evolutionary timeline.
"This would be significant because it means we might have to re-evaluate the origin of many features in sauropod skeletons we assumed had to do with weight support," said Western Illinois University researcher Matthew Bonnan in a separate article in the journal.
Birds of Prey: See Today's Dinosaurs
Avian Ancestors: Dinosaurs that Learned to Fly
Visit LiveScience.com for more daily news, views and scientific inquiry with an original, provocative point of view. LiveScience reports amazing, real world breakthroughs, made simple and stimulating for people on the go. Check out our collection of Amazing Images, Image Galleries, Interactive Features, Trivia and more. Sign up for our free daily email newsletter today!
Robert Roy Britt
LiveScience Senior Writer
LiveScience.com
Wednesday, July 13, 2005
Predatory dinosaurs had bird-like pulmonary system
ATHENS, Ohio – What could the fierce dinosaur T. rex and a modern songbird such as the sparrow possibly have in common? Their pulmonary systems may have been more similar than scientists previously thought, according to new research from Ohio University and Harvard University.
Though some scientists have proposed that predatory dinosaurs had lungs similar to crocodiles and other reptiles, a new study published in this week's issue of the journal Nature suggests the ancient beasts boasted a much bigger, more complex system of air sacs similar to that in today's birds. The finding is one of several studies in recent years to paint a new, more avian-like portrait of meat-eaters such as T. rex: The creatures may have had feathers, incubated their eggs, grown quickly and perhaps even breathed like birds.
"What was once formally considered unique to birds was present in some form in the ancestors of birds," said Patrick O'Connor, an assistant professor of biomedical sciences at Ohio University's College of Osteopathic Medicine and lead author on the study, which was funded in part by the National Science Foundation.
O'Connor and collaborator Leon Claessens of Harvard University visited museums in New York, Berkeley, Chicago, Pittsburgh, Washington, D.C., Berlin and London to examine the bones of ancient beasts, and also studied a 67-million-year-old dinosaur, Majungatholus atopus, that O'Connor had discovered in Madagascar as a graduate student in 1996. They compared the dinosaur skeletons with those of modern birds to draw comparisons of how the soft tissues in the dinosaurs may have been structured.
Birds long have fascinated biologists because of their unusual pulmonary system. Pulmonary air sacs prompt air to pass through the lungs twice during ventilation. This system also creates holes in the skeleton of birds, which has led to a popular notion that birds have "air in their bones," O'Connor said.
The new study, which examined how the air system invades the skeleton in areas such as the neck, chest and hips, finds similarities between the vertebral column of dinosaurs and birds that point to a common soft tissue system as the culprit. Though probably not identical to living birds, "it's nothing like the crocodile system as we know it," O'Connor said.
"The pulmonary system of meat-eating dinosaurs such as T. rex in fact shares many structural similarities with that of modern birds, which, from an engineering point of view, may possess the most efficient respiratory system of any living vertebrate inhabiting the land or sky," said Claessens, who received a Ph.D. from Harvard in organismic and evolutionary biology last month and will join the faculty at the College of the Holy Cross in Worcester, Mass., this fall.
In birds, this special anatomical configuration increases the gas exchange potential within the lungs, boosting metabolism and creating warm-bloodedness. The researchers are quick to point out, however, that the new study doesn't clearly peg predatory dinosaurs as habitually warm-blooded animals. The creatures probably had a more complex strategy, falling somewhere between what scientists define as cold- and warm-blooded. It appears that these animals had the pulmonary machinery for enhanced gas exchange, O'Connor explained, which would have pushed them closer to being warm-blooded creatures.
Previous research that pointed to a more crocodilian-like pulmonary system was based on a study of two dinosaur skeletons encased in rock. O'Connor and Claessens have expanded on that research by studying a broader collection of dinosaur skeletal remains, and are the first to integrate both anatomical and functional studies of modern birds as models of how the ancient creatures' air sacs were structured.
The scientists are part of a reinvigorated movement of researchers who are examining dinosaur bones and comparing them with modern animals to learn more about the anatomy of these extinct beasts.
###
Additional funding for the research came from the Society for Integrative and Comparative Biology, the Society of Vertebrate Paleontology, the Jurassic Foundation and the S. & D. Welles Research Fund.
Attention Reporters, Editors: Please contact Andrea Gibson for related illustrations, photos and video at gibsona@ohio.edu.
Contacts: Patrick O'Connor in Tanzania: 011-255-746-443-958, oconnorp@exchange.oucom.ohiou.edu; Andrea Gibson, (740) 597-2166, gibsona@ohio.edu; Steve Bradt, (617) 496-8070; steve_bradt@harvard.edu
Written by Andrea Gibson.
Public release date: 13-Jul-2005
[ Print Article | E-mail Article | Close Window ]
Contact: Andrea Gibson
gibsona@ohio.edu
740-597-2166
Ohio University
Though some scientists have proposed that predatory dinosaurs had lungs similar to crocodiles and other reptiles, a new study published in this week's issue of the journal Nature suggests the ancient beasts boasted a much bigger, more complex system of air sacs similar to that in today's birds. The finding is one of several studies in recent years to paint a new, more avian-like portrait of meat-eaters such as T. rex: The creatures may have had feathers, incubated their eggs, grown quickly and perhaps even breathed like birds.
"What was once formally considered unique to birds was present in some form in the ancestors of birds," said Patrick O'Connor, an assistant professor of biomedical sciences at Ohio University's College of Osteopathic Medicine and lead author on the study, which was funded in part by the National Science Foundation.
O'Connor and collaborator Leon Claessens of Harvard University visited museums in New York, Berkeley, Chicago, Pittsburgh, Washington, D.C., Berlin and London to examine the bones of ancient beasts, and also studied a 67-million-year-old dinosaur, Majungatholus atopus, that O'Connor had discovered in Madagascar as a graduate student in 1996. They compared the dinosaur skeletons with those of modern birds to draw comparisons of how the soft tissues in the dinosaurs may have been structured.
Birds long have fascinated biologists because of their unusual pulmonary system. Pulmonary air sacs prompt air to pass through the lungs twice during ventilation. This system also creates holes in the skeleton of birds, which has led to a popular notion that birds have "air in their bones," O'Connor said.
The new study, which examined how the air system invades the skeleton in areas such as the neck, chest and hips, finds similarities between the vertebral column of dinosaurs and birds that point to a common soft tissue system as the culprit. Though probably not identical to living birds, "it's nothing like the crocodile system as we know it," O'Connor said.
"The pulmonary system of meat-eating dinosaurs such as T. rex in fact shares many structural similarities with that of modern birds, which, from an engineering point of view, may possess the most efficient respiratory system of any living vertebrate inhabiting the land or sky," said Claessens, who received a Ph.D. from Harvard in organismic and evolutionary biology last month and will join the faculty at the College of the Holy Cross in Worcester, Mass., this fall.
In birds, this special anatomical configuration increases the gas exchange potential within the lungs, boosting metabolism and creating warm-bloodedness. The researchers are quick to point out, however, that the new study doesn't clearly peg predatory dinosaurs as habitually warm-blooded animals. The creatures probably had a more complex strategy, falling somewhere between what scientists define as cold- and warm-blooded. It appears that these animals had the pulmonary machinery for enhanced gas exchange, O'Connor explained, which would have pushed them closer to being warm-blooded creatures.
Previous research that pointed to a more crocodilian-like pulmonary system was based on a study of two dinosaur skeletons encased in rock. O'Connor and Claessens have expanded on that research by studying a broader collection of dinosaur skeletal remains, and are the first to integrate both anatomical and functional studies of modern birds as models of how the ancient creatures' air sacs were structured.
The scientists are part of a reinvigorated movement of researchers who are examining dinosaur bones and comparing them with modern animals to learn more about the anatomy of these extinct beasts.
###
Additional funding for the research came from the Society for Integrative and Comparative Biology, the Society of Vertebrate Paleontology, the Jurassic Foundation and the S. & D. Welles Research Fund.
Attention Reporters, Editors: Please contact Andrea Gibson for related illustrations, photos and video at gibsona@ohio.edu.
Contacts: Patrick O'Connor in Tanzania: 011-255-746-443-958, oconnorp@exchange.oucom.ohiou.edu; Andrea Gibson, (740) 597-2166, gibsona@ohio.edu; Steve Bradt, (617) 496-8070; steve_bradt@harvard.edu
Written by Andrea Gibson.
Public release date: 13-Jul-2005
[ Print Article | E-mail Article | Close Window ]
Contact: Andrea Gibson
gibsona@ohio.edu
740-597-2166
Ohio University
Saturday, July 09, 2005
Nobel Prize Winner Claude Simon
Nobel laureate Claude Simon, a pioneer of the experimental "new novel" style of the late 1950s and early 1960s.
The Swedish Academy that awarded Simon the 1985 Nobel Prize in literature cited the novel "Les Georgiques" ("The Georgics") as perhaps his most important work. The 1981 novel depicts Simon's experience with the Republican side in the Spanish Civil War.
At the time, he was the first Frenchman to win the Nobel since playwright and author Jean-Paul Sartre was honored with the award but turned it down in 1964.
Born of French parents on Oct. 10, 1913, in Tananarive, on the island of Madagascar, Simon began writing in 1945 with "Le Tricheur" ("The Cheat,") an existential fable that resembled Albert Camus' "The Stranger."
The author of more than 20 works, his major literary breakthrough as an exponent of the French "nouveau roman" or new novel style came in 1960, with "La Route Des Flandres" ("The Flanders Road") set during World War II.
The "new novel" style dispensed with such literary norms as plot and character development. Simon's novels present characters in a state of emotional turmoil, often obsessed with memories.
Simon's intricate, free-flowing style makes his works difficult to read — said to partly explain why he was not well-known even in France. Some critics have compared his jumbled chronology and abrupt transitions to the techniques of William Faulkner, the American author.
"French literature has lost one of its greatest authors," Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin said in a statement from his office. "Claude Simon will remain as one of the great novelists of collective and individual memory."
Simon once said of his own work: "I am incapable of making up a story. All I write is taken directly from real life, I only copy reality."
As a young man, Simon showed a passion for photography and painting. At 23, he joined the Republican side in the Spanish Civil War. In World War II, he fought in the 1940 Battle of the Meuse and was taken prisoner, but later escaped and joined the Resistance.
Simon's last novel, "The Trolley" of 2001, recalled his life as a boy in Perpignan, and depicted how the foundation of a person's life is what he remembers.
"People will get to understand my work sooner or later. This is nothing new, that some authors are considered difficult," he was quoted by Swedish news agency TT as saying in 1985.
By JAMEY KEATEN, Associated Press Writer
1 hour, 42 minutes ago
The Swedish Academy that awarded Simon the 1985 Nobel Prize in literature cited the novel "Les Georgiques" ("The Georgics") as perhaps his most important work. The 1981 novel depicts Simon's experience with the Republican side in the Spanish Civil War.
At the time, he was the first Frenchman to win the Nobel since playwright and author Jean-Paul Sartre was honored with the award but turned it down in 1964.
Born of French parents on Oct. 10, 1913, in Tananarive, on the island of Madagascar, Simon began writing in 1945 with "Le Tricheur" ("The Cheat,") an existential fable that resembled Albert Camus' "The Stranger."
The author of more than 20 works, his major literary breakthrough as an exponent of the French "nouveau roman" or new novel style came in 1960, with "La Route Des Flandres" ("The Flanders Road") set during World War II.
The "new novel" style dispensed with such literary norms as plot and character development. Simon's novels present characters in a state of emotional turmoil, often obsessed with memories.
Simon's intricate, free-flowing style makes his works difficult to read — said to partly explain why he was not well-known even in France. Some critics have compared his jumbled chronology and abrupt transitions to the techniques of William Faulkner, the American author.
"French literature has lost one of its greatest authors," Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin said in a statement from his office. "Claude Simon will remain as one of the great novelists of collective and individual memory."
Simon once said of his own work: "I am incapable of making up a story. All I write is taken directly from real life, I only copy reality."
As a young man, Simon showed a passion for photography and painting. At 23, he joined the Republican side in the Spanish Civil War. In World War II, he fought in the 1940 Battle of the Meuse and was taken prisoner, but later escaped and joined the Resistance.
Simon's last novel, "The Trolley" of 2001, recalled his life as a boy in Perpignan, and depicted how the foundation of a person's life is what he remembers.
"People will get to understand my work sooner or later. This is nothing new, that some authors are considered difficult," he was quoted by Swedish news agency TT as saying in 1985.
By JAMEY KEATEN, Associated Press Writer
1 hour, 42 minutes ago
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)