Jean Lorrain (9 August 1855 in Fécamp, Seine-Maritime – 30 June 1906), born Paul Alexandre Martin Duval, was a French poet and novelist of the Symbolist school.

Lorrain was a dedicated disciple of dandyism and spent much of his time amongst the fashionable artistic circles in France, particularly in the cafés and bars of Montmartre.

[1] He contributed to the satirical weekly Le Courrier français, and wrote a number of collections of verse, including La forêt bleue (1883) and L'ombre ardente (1897).

[4] Due to tubercular symptoms, he started using morphine, and then moved on to drinking ether, a habit he shared with Guy de Maupassant.

Under the influence of ether Lorrain wrote several horror stories, but eventually the substance gave him stomach ulcers and health problems.