Meeting Benjamin Legrand


He was Tom Wolfe's translator in France and is co-author of "Snowpiercer" a graphic novel adapted for the cinema by Bong Joon-ho (the Palme d'Or and Oscar-winning director of "Parasite"). 

Legrand wrote the graphic novel "Cockroach Killer," a conspiracy thriller that was translated in the U.S. by the late Kim Thompson of Fantagraphics and illustrated by the prolific comics artist and author Jacques Tardi.

When I asked him about his crime novels, he singled out "The Bronx" (1977), about Puerto Rican gangs in New York. 

Translating Wolfe's "Bonfire of the Vanities" took eight months, he said, in part because of the challenges posed by its characters' Southern accents.

His father was the French composer Raymond Legrand, and his sister was the jazz singer Christiane Legrand, who appears on the "The Umbrellas of Cherbourg" soundtrack.

We were standing at the bar at La Pergola. Quite a thrill!


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