Boulle, Pierre-Francois-Marie-Louis

▪ 1995

      French novelist (b. Feb. 20, 1912, Avignon, France—d. Jan. 30, 1994, Paris, France), was best known for two vastly different novels, Le Pont de la rivière Kwaï (1952; The Bridge on the River Kwai; film adaptation, 1957), a World War II tale of morality and madness among British troops in a Japanese prison camp, and the science-fiction fable La Planète des singes (1963; Planet of the Apes). The film adaptation of the latter (1968) spawned several sequels and a television series. Boulle trained as an electrical engineer in Paris, but in 1938 he moved to Malaysia to work on a rubber plantation. During World War II he was an intelligence agent in Southeast Asia. In 1942 he was captured while on a mission in French Indochina, but he escaped in 1944. After the war he returned to France to try his hand at writing. His first novel, William Conrad (1950), which concerned a German spy in wartime Britain, introduced the issues of morality and honour that he expanded in later books. In River Kwai Boulle examined the plight of British soldiers compelled by their own commanding officer's obsessive work ethic and misplaced sense of honour to build a bridge for their Japanese captors. The book, which was translated into more than 20 languages, caused an international sensation, as did the Academy Award-winning film based on it. Boulle's other works include La Face (1953; The Face), Aux sources de la rivière Kwaï (1967; My Own River Kwai), Les Oreilles de jungle (1972; Ears of the Jungle), Le Bon Leviathan (1978; The Good Leviathan), and À nous deux, Satan (1992).

* * *