Alain Bosquet
The literary pseudonym of Anatole Bisk (or Bisque: note anagram)

French writer of Russian origin (Odessa, 1919 – Paris, 1998). Son of a poet father who lived from the proceeds of commerce in stamp-collecting, his mother, a violinist, had Jascha Heifetz as a teacher. After studies in Brussels, then at the Sorbonne, he enlisted in the U.S. Army during WWII and became the sub-editor of Voix de la France in New York. In charge of the mission on behalf of the quadripartite Council which oversaw the administration of Berlin from 1945 to 1951, he subsequently taught in the United States headed the jury of the Prix Max Jacob, the Académie Mallarmé and was a member of the Royal Academy of Belgium. A poet noted for surrealism (Syncopes, 1943; Premier Testament, 1957; Cent Notes pour une solitude, 1969; Un jour après la vie, 1984; le Tourment de Dieu, prix Goncourt de poésie, 1987; Je ne suis pas un poète d'eau douce, 1996), he also wrote novels: la Confession mexicaine (prix Interallié, 1965), le Métier d'otage (1989), les Fruits de l'an dernier (1996); essays (Anthologie de la poésie française contemporaine, les trente dernières années, 1994); stories (Georges, Arnold, Arnold et Georges, 1995); plays (Un détenu à Auschwitz, 1991; Kafka-Auschwitz, 1993) and an autobiography where irony is countered by tenderness: Une mére russe (Grand prix du roman de l'Académie française, 1978).