MORAND, PAUL

born March 13, 1888, Paris, France died July 24, 1976, Paris French diplomat and novelist. Morand joined the diplomatic service in 1912, serving as attach in London, Rome, Madrid, and Siam (Thailand). In his early fiction, Ouvert la nuit (1922; Open All Night), Ferm la nuit (1923; Closed All Night), and Lewis et Irne (1924; Lewis and Irene), he borrowed the cinematic techniques of rapid scene changing and transported the reader back and forth from one capital to another, capturing with posterlike brilliance the feverish atmosphere of the 1920s. Later he wrote several collections of short stories and such novels as L'Homme press (1941; The Harried Man), Le Flagellant de Seville (1951; The Flagellant of Seville), Hcate et ses chiens (1955; Hecate and Her Dogs), and Tais-toi (1965; Be Quiet). He also wrote a few biographies, most notably Ci-git Sophie Dorothe de Celle (1968; The Captive Princess: Sophia Dorothea of Celle). A world traveler, he wrote excellent impressionistic accounts of cities in the Orient, Africa, and North and South America. During World War II Morand continued to serve as a diplomat, but, because of his collaboration with the Vichy government, he was dismissed in 1945, and his candidacy for the French Academy was opposed in 1959. He was admitted, however, in 1968.