- Born
- Died
- Birth nameSidonie Gabrielle Colette
- Nickname
- La bonne dame du Palais-Royal
- Colette was born on January 28, 1873 in Saint-Sauveur-en-Puisaye, Yonne, France. She was a writer, known for Gigi (1958), Chéri (2009) and Claudine (1913). She was married to Maurice Goudeket, Henri de Jouvenel des Ursins and Willy. She died on August 3, 1954 in Paris, France.
- SpousesMaurice Goudeket(1935 - August 3, 1954) (her death)Henri de Jouvenel des Ursins(December 19, 1912 - April 1925) (1 child)Willy(May 15, 1893 - 1910) (divorced)
- Children
- Had a trapeze installed in her home gymnasium as her preferred way to stay in shape.
- French novelist and memoirist, usually preoccupied with erotic themes. Married the pornographer Willy who helped publish her four "Claudine" novels (1900-1902). For a while earned money as a music hall artist. Through her second marriage, she became a leading Parisian socialite and began writing novels of great sensitivity, including "Sido" (1929) and "Gigi" (1944).
- One daughter: Colette Renée de Jouvenel des Ursins, born July 3 1913, died 1981.
- Loved cats, and played them in the theatre. She once played the part of a sphinx, and later a cat in the play La Chatte Amoureuse ("The Amourous Cat").
- Mother of second unit director 'Colette de Jouvenel'.
- On love: Nothing leads to love. It is love who throws himself across your path. And then he either blocks it forever or, if he abandons it, leaves it in rack and ruin.
- On solitude: There are days when solitude is a heady wine which intoxicates you with freedom, others when it is a bitter tonic, and still others when it is a poison which makes you beat your head against the wall.
- On mothering: To talk to a child, to fascinate him, is much more difficult than to win an electoral victory. But it is also more rewarding.
- On growth: It is the fight itself that keeps you young.
- On experience: One keeps forgetting old age up to the very brink of the grave.
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