author
Jacques Morel
1867–1949
A French novelist who wrote under a masculine pen name, this Prix Femina winner is best remembered for the quiet success of Feuilles mortes in 1912. Behind that name was Madeleine Paule Gorges, a Paris-born writer whose work stayed active across the early decades of the 20th century.
1 Audiobook
Feuilles mortes
by Jacques Morel
About the author
Writing as Jacques Morel, Madeleine Paule Gorges was born in Paris on March 11, 1867, and died there on December 10, 1949. She was a French author who used the name Jacques Morel as a pseudonym, and she is often identified in reference sources as Madeleine Pottier after her marriage to the archaeologist Edmond Pottier.
She is best known for winning the Prix Femina in 1912 for Feuilles mortes. Reference listings for her work also connect her with other titles including Muets aveux (1901), La Dette (1905), Par un chemin détourné (1927), and L'Homme dangereux (1930), showing a literary career that stretched over many years.
Although she is not widely known today, the record of her awards suggests she had a respected place in French literary life. For listeners exploring overlooked writers of the period, Jacques Morel offers an interesting glimpse of a woman author publishing under a male pen name in the literary world of her time.