ÉTONNEZ-MOI: FRANÇOISE HARDY & PATRICK MODIANO

by Valerie Simadis

Nobel laureate Patrick Modiano is best known for his captivating works of fiction (In The Café of Lost Youth, So You Don’t Get Lost in the Neighborhood, Missing Person), his collaboration with film maker Louis Malle on the screenplay for Lacombe Lucien, and his flâneur-esque accounts of his native France. “I have long been addicted to walking the different quarters of Paris, and still feel a flâneur’s fascination for street names.” Modiano explained to The Guardian’s Euan Cameron. “When I first began to wander the streets of the city I would feel a mixture of fear and fascination.” This fear and fascination fueled Modiano’s creativity. In 1968 he began to write songs with musician Hughes de Courson – four of which would be recorded by Françoise Hardy. In recent years, Courson and Hardy recalled their first encounter with Modiano, the painfully shy, yet mysterious introvert who penned unique and outlandish songs.

Françoise Hardy and Patrick Modiano circa 1968 (photographer unknown). [Last photo via Wikimedia Commons.]

Patrick Modiano was born on July 30, 1945 in the western suburbs of Paris. His father, Albert Modiano was a Jewish-Italian businessman, and his mother Louisa (née Colpeyn) was a Belgian actress. According to Modiano, his mother was frequently away on tour, while his father lived in the “murky world of secret dealings and the black market.” During WWII, Albert refused to wear the yellow star and somehow avoided being captured and sent off to Auschwitz. Inspired by his father’s journey, Paris during the Second World War is a recurring theme and topic in Modiano’s novels. During his speech after accepting the Nobel prize in literature, he declared “Like all those born in 1945, I am a child of the war, and more specifically, since I was born in Paris, a child who owed his birth to the Paris of the occupation.”

“Faced with the silence of our parents, we worked it all out as if we had lived it ourselves.”

Growing up, Modiano led a rather nomadic lifestyle and was often sent (along with his brother Rudy) to board with friends of his parents. After the death of his brother in 1957, Modiano was left to face boarding school, and the impending divorce of his parents on his own. “I was left to my own devices.” Modiano recalled “I began to wander through the streets of the city and would feel a mixture of fear and fascination. I forced myself to go further from home each time.” In 1960, Modiano ran away from boarding school and was truly left to his own devices. In the forthcoming years, he attended the Collège Saint- Joseph de Thônes, and the Lycée Henri-IV, earning himself a second baccalaureate. According to Modiano, he enrolled in the Sorbonne merely to avoid the draft, and in 1965, began to work on his first novel – La Place de l’Etoile.

Editor’s Note: It is imperative to note that Modiano’s mother played a major role in his literary career. Louisa worked in theatre and film, and had connections with Jean-Paul Sartre and Raymond Queneau.

Patrick Modiano and Louis Malle being interviewed by a journalist.
Photo by Robert Belleret.[Source: Wikimedia Commons]

“No doubt, Patrick was very deprived materially at that time. He seemed quite disembodied and distracted. I often took him to a restaurant for dinner. I also took him to Théâtre Antoine to see the great James Saunders play Next Time I’ll Sing To You. We more or less discovered the music of Stockhausen together.”

During this time, Modiano teamed up with his former classmate Hughes de Courson and they began to write songs together. According to Courson, Modiano would write lyrics while he would compose a melody. “I wouldn’t rewrite his lyrics, out of respect for his idea…” Courson stated “…but sometimes I’d add or trim a few words to create a rhyme or beat.” In 1968, Modiano and Courson attended a (failed) audition for the radio show Europe 1. While the duo didn’t secure a spot on the radio show, Louisa pulled a few strings and landed them a meeting with French yé-yé star Françoise Hardy. (Editor’s Note: That year, Modiano’s first book was published by Èditions Gallimard.)

Françoise Hardy – Etonnez moi, Benoit

Modiano and Courson would go on to write four songs for Hardy, including “Étonnez Moi Benoît”, “À cloche-pied sur la grande muraille de Chine”, “San Salvador”, and “Je fais des puzzle”. Evidently, Modiano’s collaboration with Françoise Hardy made headlines, as there are various photos of them posing for the press on the river Seine. During an interview with journalist Mohammed Aïssaoui, Hardy spoke of her admiration for Modiano’s writing, and her first impression of the diffident songwriter. “No doubt, Patrick was very deprived materially at that time. He seemed quite disembodied and distracted. I often took him to a restaurant for dinner. I also took him to The Théâtre Antoine to see the great James Saunders play Next Time I’ll Sing To You. We more or less discovered the music of Stockhausen together.” She recalled.

Françoise Hardy in Amsterdam, December 16, 1969. Photograph by Joost Evers. / During the filming of Grand Prix, August 1966. Photo by Robert Huhardeaux. [Source: Wikimedia Commons]

In a recent interview with Peter De Jongue, the journalist asked Hardy whether the cruel lyrics of “Étonnez Moi Benoît” disturbed her. “It made me laugh.”, she stated. “‘Cut off your ears.’ I thought it was very funny.” According to Hughes de Courson, the song “Demonstrates the cruelty that ensues when one half of a couple holds all the cards.”

Surprise me, Benoît

Walk on your hands

Swallow pinecones, Benoît

Apricots and pears

And razor blades

Surprise me. . . .

Surprise me, Benoît

Cut off your ears

Eat one or two bees, Benoît

Be the sun in my life

Make the alarm clock ring

Surprise me

Coincidentally, Hardy appears to be one of the few people who is still in touch with Modiano. “My first success was a song about how ‘nobody loves me’.” Françoise recalled to De Jongue. She then went on to say that Modiano’s lyrics often contemplate solitude and its toll. “Like any great writer…” Françoise reflected “Patrick has a tone, a music that belongs only to him that has an incredibly bewitching power.”

“Yes, the years are running fast. And what to do to hold the time? Maybe try to rediscover in the bottom of a drawer, a bunch of songs which have been drying there for a dozen years.” -Patrick Modiano (from the liner notes of Fonds de tiroir [1967])

Modiano / De Courson – Le commandeur

Throughout the 1960s, Modiano wrote dozens of songs with Hughes de Courson. In 1979 they released an album entitled Fonds de tiroir [1967], Fonds de tiroir meaning “the bottom of the drawer”. In the liner notes, Modiano explains the meaning behind the title, “Everything ends up in drawers. You just have to open them and find again the lost years, with the dried flowers, the yellowed photographs, and the songs. Someone has said that the best way to relive the passed moments are scents and songs. What are the scents of 1967? I don’t know, but in the meantime I found in the bottom of the drawer a few songs that Hughes de Courson and I wrote in this particular year.” Courson recorded the album in five days, while Modiano attended each session. Four years later, Courson suggested they release the album on CD and this led to an argument between him and Modiano. “I said, ‘Patrick, I will release this CD even if it prevents you from winning the Nobel Prize.’ It was a joke, but I was relieved to see that it didn’t cost him that.” The songwriting duo have been estranged ever since. 

Patrick Modiano in Börshuset in Stockholm during the Swedish Academy’s press conference, December 6, 2014. Photo by Frankie Fouganthin. [Source: Wikimedia Commons]

In recent years, Modiano has not penned any songs (that we know of), though he has released over a dozen titles. In addition to winning the 2014 Nobel Prize in literature, he previously won the 2012 Austrian State Prize for European Literature, the 2010 Prix mondial Cino Del Duca from the Institut de France for lifetime achievement, the 1978 Prix Goncourt for Rue des boutiques obscures, and the 1972 Grand Prix du roman de l’Académie française for Les Boulevards de ceinture. Ironically, before winning the Nobel Prize in 2014, most of Modiano’s novels had not been translated to English. As Françoise Hardy would attest to, he is finally receiving the recognition that he deserves.

“When I start one of [Modiano’s] novels, I can’t stop: he knows how to put mystery and emotion where there might not be any without his own gaze, without his very particular imagination…it is his vision of himself that makes his stories so fascinating.” – Françoise Hardy

Copyright © 2023, Valerie Simadis. All Rights Reserved.

Citations:

Όνομα. “A Music Box / 4 Songs for Francoise Hardy: Patrick Modiano, 1967-70.” C o c o s s e, 5 Feb. 2023, https://www.cocosse.com/2014/10/a-music-box-4-songs-for-francoise-hardy-patrick-modiano-1967-70/.

Figaro_Culture. “Françoise Hardy: ‘Modiano Paraissait Désincarné,Distrait.’” LEFIGARO, 19 Jan. 2012, https://www.lefigaro.fr/livres/2012/01/17/03005-20120117ARTFIG00748-francoise-hardy-modiano-paraissait-desincarnedistrait.php.

Jonge, Peter De, et al. “The Notes of Patrick Modiano, by Peter De Jonge.” Harper’s Magazine , 18 Dec. 2016, https://harpers.org/archive/2017/01/the-notes-of-patrick-modiano/.

Kaplan, Alice. “Lamplight and Shadow.” The Paris Review, 25 Feb. 2017, https://www.theparisreview.org/blog/2017/02/24/lamplight-and-shadow/.

Modiano, Patrick, et al. Suspended Sentences: Three Novellas. Yale University Press, 2015.

“The Nobel Prize in Literature 2014.” NobelPrize.org, https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/literature/2014/modiano/biographical/.

“Patrick Modiano: ‘I Became a Prisoner of My Memories of Paris’.” The Guardian, Guardian News and Media, 31 Oct. 2015, https://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/oct/31/patrick-modiano-interview-paris-nobel.

“Uma Imagem Que Vale Por Tudo: Patrick Modiano e Françoise Hardy. E Françoise Hardy a Cantar Modiano.” Uma Imagem Que Vale Por Tudo: Patrick Modiano e Françoise Hardy. E Françoise Hardy a Cantar Modiano., https://ler.blogs.sapo.pt/uma-imagem-que-vale-por-tudo-patrick-999637.