Pierre Leyris

Pierre Leyris (16 July 1907 – 4 January 2001) was a French translator.

The writers who benefited from his talent were, among others, Shakespeare in the complete edition of the Club français du livre [fr], Melville, Jean Rhys, Yeats, Dickens, Stevenson, Hawthorne and De Quincey.

His four-volume translation of the works of William Blake, published by Aubier & Flammarion, remains the most complete in French and earned him the 1974 Prix Valery Larbaud.. After studying at lycée Janson-de-Sailly, he appeared in the avant-garde literary circles.

In high school he met Pierre Klossowski, who allowed him to meet his brother, the painter Balthus, and the poet Pierre Jean Jouve.

[2] Long a collection director at the Mercure de France, he published Esquisse d'une anthologie de la poésie américaine du XIXe at Gallimard in 1995.