‘Embryonic’: lost novel by French film-maker Éric Rohmer is republished
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- Élisabeth, written by 24-year-old Maurice Schérer in Nazi-occupied Paris under the pseudonym Gilbert Cordier, has been republished in English by Aaron Kerner, eight decades after it first slipped out of print
- Schérer abandoned literature after the novel's failure, adopting a second pseudonym—Éric Rohmer—and pivoting to film criticism and directing as part of the French New Wave alongside Claude Chabrol, Jean-Luc Godard, and François Truffaut
- Novelist André Aciman, who wrote the foreword, called the book 'embryonic and full of Rohmerian moments' but also 'a footnote,' while New Yorker critic Richard Brody said it would be rewarding 'even if the identity of its author were unfamiliar'
- Rohmer kept his entire filmmaking career secret from his Catholic parents—who believed he was a teacher—giving conflicting accounts of his birthplace (Tulle or Nancy) and real name (Maurice or Jean-Marie)
- Rohmer's directing style, per critic Adrian Martin, relied on improvisation with crews of just 3-4 people, avoiding multiple takes and sometimes yelling 'Just do it!' from another room during scenes
- Rohmer's acclaimed films—Claire's Knee (1970), Pauline à la Plage (1983), and the Tales of the Four Seasons series (1990-1998)—revisit the same themes of footloose youth, flirtation, and hyper-rationalized desire that Élisabeth first explored
Why it matters: The republication reframes Rohmer not as a filmmaker who dabbled in prose, but as a writer whose literary themes—flirtation, rationalization, summer idleness—were already fully formed by 1939, 16 years before his first masterwork. For cinephiles, the book offers a rare textual window into scripts he never filmed; for scholars, it confirms the New Wave auteur's Catholic family never learned of his career, a deception spanning his entire adult life.
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