Alphonse Boudard

Boudard's 1995 novel Dying childhood was awarded and recognised by the French Academy with a Grand Prix du roman de l'Académie française.

[1] He was brought up first by an adoptive family in the Loiret region of the centre of France, then by his grandmother in the south of Paris.

His early adult life was spent in casual work, periods in jail and in a sanatorium recovering from tuberculosis.

His novels are characterised by the colloquial terms and slang that Boudard used to describe life in the 1940s.

His 1963 novel The Cherry and his 1972 story The Hospital are examples, as is his 1992 novel The Amazing Mr Joseph which tells the story of a French spy who becomes a millionaire dealing on the black market during World War II (based on the real career of Joseph Joanovici).