Adjunct Professor and honorary graduate of NUI Galway, the late Michel Déon was remembered this week at the university as the Chair of French will be named in his honour. The event took place as part of a day of tribute to the French author jointly organised by NUI Galway, Cúirt International Festival of Literature and the French Embassy, in the presence of French Ambassador to Ireland, M. Jean-Pierre Thébault, and of one of Michel Déon’s fellow members of the Académie Française, M. Frédéric Vitoux.
NUI Galway was proud to honour the literary achievements of Michel Déon on the occasion of his conferring with an honorary degree some decades ago. In conferring that honour the NUI was pleased to celebrate Michel’s remarkable talent as a French writer and ‘académicien’; his enduring bond with Ireland and his important role in sharing the Irish artistic imagination with the world.”
Born in Paris in 1919, Déon spent over forty years in Tynagh Co Galway with his wife and family. He was one of the most respected writers of his time, a chronological span of some 70 years of writing from his first novel Adieux à Sheila(1944 ) to his last work – it comprises a total of more than 50 books and hundreds of editions
