Bibliothèque de Suzette was first advertised in La Semaine de Suzette, no 41, 13 Nov. 1919. It consisted of 10 titles
(1ère série).
In December 1920, in time for Christmas and the New Year, G&L advertised a Nouvelle Série of another ten titles, (2me série). The volumes were all un-numbered.

The titles were book versions of some of the feuilletons G&L had published in La Semaine de Suzette since 1905, written by authors who were also writing for their other collections Bibliothèque de ma Fille and Collection Familia and for Catholic publishers such as Mame & Fils and La Maison de La Bonne Presse.

They were all inspired by the highest moral and religious, i.e. Catholic, principles. The collection continued unchanged until 1959 when it was renamed Nouvelle Bibliothèque de Suzette (NBS).
From n°52 (Claudia la petite romaine, publ. in 1963), it became Bibliothèque Bleue.

Publications ended in 1965.

The whole collection consists of 249 titles (see LIST). A very few titles were re-edited in the mid-'90s in the collection Enquêtes de La Bibliothèque de Suzette (Editions du Triomphe).

WHERE TO FIND SUZETTES: THEMA LIVRES an excellent online bookshop for La Semaine & Bibliothèque. BD.anciennes une boutique en ligne, située à Bordeaux entièrement dédiée à la bande dessinée ancienne offers a vast choice of early Suzettes **** Nouvelle Bibliothèque de Suzette

AUTHOR

La Bataille des fleurs
Paroles de Amélie Amestoy
Musique de Georges Meugé

GEORGES MEUGE
(b.4 July 1847, Vernon,27 -d. 9 June 1916, Mantes la Jolie,78)
Fonctionnaire de l'Adm. Pénitenciaire. Musicien

Pseudonyme d'Ilka Anne Irma Charlotte Rézette Mme René Bolles et de sa fille Jacqueline.
Elle épousa René Bollès (ou Bolle) le 22 Mai 1924. Ils eurent trois garçons et deux filles et divorcerent en 1937
Rézette entama des etudes de music (piano) et peinture. Elle exposa au Palais de Beaux Arts , Bruxelles en 1937. Le peintre Emile Lecombe peignit son portrait en 1937.
Rezétte utilise des pseudonymes différents selon le genre de littérature: Ann et Gwen (littérature sentimentale et romans pour enfants), Ilka Legrand (romans policiers), Cécile d'Argel (romans pour enfants). - Elle aurait également utilisé les pseudonymes Marc Roger et Pierre Lacombe (cit. BNF).

En 1970 avec sa fille Claude et deux amies elle fut présente à la réunion annuelle du Clan Mac Pherson à Badenoch, Invernessshire, Scotland, pour faire des reserches historiques sur les Clans ecossais et sur Prince Charles Edward Stuart. Sa presence fut notée dans la revue du Clan, Creag Dhubh no23 qui écrit
"We are hearing a great deal of news coming from Brussels, the capital of Belgium. We were charmed to receive into our midst two delightful ladies from Belgium at our 1970 Rally. Both authors, Carmen d'Aubrey comes from Brussels and Ilka Rezette from rural Belgium. We received a letter and a manuscript from these ladies describing our 1970 Rally in delightfully fresh terms as seen through the eyes of others. Various factors, not least the postal strike, disorganised things to such an extent that we must hold over their contribution till Creag Dhubh 1972. Such is their obvious warmth and affection for our clan that we hope that perhaps, in time, they might be able to be awarded the same honours as accorded to Professor Julius Pokorny in last year's issue".

Bertier Françoise: Illustratrice
Also known as Françoise Jacques-Bertier, she was for many years a regular illustrator for La Semaine de Suzette

Edith Follet - Illustratrice
Edith Amandine Marie FOLLET
(b.Rennes 12 May 1899-d. Paris 9 March 1990)
Fille de Anasthase, directeur de l'école de Medicine de Rennes a été l'épouse de Louis-Ferdinand Céline de 1919 à 1926. Ils eurent une fille, Colette. Après Céline elle se remaria avec un officier et eu un fils.
D'abord illustratrice pour Nilsson, à partir de 1941 elle collabore avec les pubblications Gautier-Languereau et notamment La Semaine de Suzette.

She was educated at the Lycée de Pau and apart the war years she lived all her life in Pau, rue Galos 17, where she ran a boarding-house.
She started her career writing poetry: Eve (Prix Sully Prudhomme 1932), Cybèle (1936).
Poet laureate by Académie des jeux floraux, concours 1932.
She made her debut as a novelist with Le passager de la Belle Aventure in 1952 followed by the better known La Porte retombée, Prix Femina 1960, in which she spoke of the Jews in terms which did not please a member of the jury, Beatrix Beck, Gide's former secretary, but Dominique Rolin defended Bellocq and Beck resigned in protest (ajcarchives.org).
Prix exceptionnel du roman pyrénéen for La Ferme de l'Ermitage, 1956.
In 1961 she was awarded the Médaille d'honneur de la Littérature d'Aquitaine.
She spent her war time years in Bretagne where she set her third novel Mesdames Minnignan. She developed a passion for the sea.
Bellocq was the surname of her grand-mother.

Mademoiselle Giboulée, ill. Pierre Couronne,
(NBS n° 3, 1959 & 1961)
L'Intrépide Giboulée, ill. Pierre Couronne
(NBS no 13, 1960)
Giboulée au Pays Basque, ill. Pierre Couronne
(NBS no 29, 1961)
Giboulée et le fantôme, ill. Pierre Couronne,
(NBS no 43, 1962)
Giboulée sur la Côte d'Azur, ill. Pierre Couronne
(Bibliothèque Bleue no 56 1963)
Giboulée antiquaire, ill. Pierre Couronne
(Bibliothèque Bleue no 62,1964
Giboulée en Bretagne, ill. Pierre Couronne
(Bibliothèque Bleue, no 68, 1965

Translated in Turkish: "Ömerin bisikleti" & "Kücük Ömer ormanda"

Read the full biography by Serge.

Children's mystery adventures writer. Best known for his long series of adventure books called Les six Compagnons.
Prix du salon de l'enfance (Jeunesse) 1958.

Marie France - Translator
French, 3/6/1904 - 28/7/1994)
Pseudonyme de Françoise Sébileau, première dirigeante nationale du mouvement Ames vaillantes (now L'Action Catholique des Enfants, un mouvement chrétien d'éducation populaire s'adressant aux enfants et aux jeunes de 5 à 15 ans)
A également écrit dans le journal "Ames vaillantes" sous les pseudonymes "Claude Falaise" et "Noël Aubled" (BNF)

Children's author. Television producer.
Daughter of Frederick Leonard and Sepha (Sale) Brown.
Educated at Colchester Bounty High School, Brecon.
County School, & RADA.
Married Donald Masters actor in 1949.

She wrote her first novel The Swish of the Curtain (1941), at 14. Trained as an actress at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art, she worked on the stage as ‘Mela Brown'. She wrote several sequels to her first book, and other children's novels; for some years she produced children's programmes for BBC television. BBC Children's Programmes. 1950-55. Scottish TV . 1957-8
(credits:www.collectingbooksandmagazines.com & googlebook & The Author's & Writer's Who's who, 1971).

As part of his research on the biography of Captain James Cook, published Hodder & Stoughton 1995, Hough consulted numerous archives and traced Cook's travels from Alaska to Tasmania, visiting many of the Pacific islands, including the Hawaiian archipelago where Cook met his death.

1)"Richard Alexander Hough was born in Brighton, Sussex, England in 1922 and served as a pilot in the Royal Air Force during World War II. He worked as an editor, then as a manager of a publishing firm. From 1955-1970 he was an editor of children's books; during that period also began his career as a writer of books for both adults and children. His work falls into areas that he found interesting as a child: flying, maritime history, science fiction, animals, and adventure" (from Something About the Author, 1976)
2) British naval historian, biographer and children's writer. After a long career in publishing, Hough became a full-time writer in 1970. He wrote nearly 100 books including The Battle of Jutland (1969), Captain Bligh and Mr Christian (1972), Great admirals (1977), Mountbatten: hero of our time (1980) and Captain James Cook (1994)
(text from National Library of Australia).

Son of Ludovic Auguste négociant at Marseille and Marie Julie Honorine, Charles-Roux Chancel was born in Marseille on 25 September 1867. He married Claire Elisabeth Madeleine Aragon 26 April 1897. They had six children. One Charles Antoine Ludovic, became ambassador (France Ambassador to Haiti in 1950 and Prague 1961 & other posts); another Jean-Louis Roger became a painter & cartonist-illustrator, stage designer; in 1945 he was awarded the Ordre de la Libération the second highest French honor after the Légion d'Honneur.

Chancel could trace his ancestry back to the XVI Century: one of his ancestors born in 1714 was " Maître-apothicaire du Roi".

Chancel combined a successfull career as a playwriter with that of a writer and a journalist.
Amongst the innumerable successful operettas and stage plays he wrote, stands out the 1910 adaptation of Rêve d'un valse by Oscar Strauss and his play The Prince Consort, written with Leon Xanrof, which was filmed in 1929 by Lubitsch as The Love Parade. The film was included in Dictionary of 1,000 best films by by R. A. E. Pickard, 1971.

War correspondant for L'Illustration in the Middle East during WWI. Contributor to La Baionette. Parisian correspondent for La Dépêche du Centre. Founder (with others) of La Maison de La Prese Parisienne. Redacteur en chef de La Sartrhe (1927).
Author of three collection for juveniles: Les Enfants à l'Etranger, Les enfants à travers l'histoire, Les Enfants aux Colonies.
An interesting book by Chancel is Six ans après, un mark=six francs, written in 1929, a reportage on Germany ten years after the end of the Great War.

Bailly Louis - Illustrator
(1875-1958)
Il épousa Hilda Ernst (1877-1968) fille du peintre orientaliste autrichien Rudolf Ernst.

Biblio: Louise Vaquette, Odette, 1903, La fleurette du temple, 1920, Kipling, de Musset Mimi Pinson, 1914, Images d' Epinal, Les Burgraves de Victor Hugo: série de cartes postales illustrées en couleur par L. Bailly sans ni date ni imprimeur au Musée Victor Hugo de Villequier.

(source: Le plaisir du livre et de l'image de Jean-Paul Gourevitch & BNF, & Musée Dept de Villequier & IMDb & genealogy Chancel by Charles DE RAPHELIS SOISSAN)

Daughter of Paul Chaurand and Marguerite de Crécy. She had an older brother, François (b. 07/05/1919 - d.23/04/1920), who died of Spanish flu.
Her father died in 1926, just one year after her birth and she was brought up by her mother (who never remarried) and her extended family.
Nicknamed Ninon, she made her secondary studies in Paysac (Ardèche). After WWII she entered as editor at Bayard Presse where she spent all her working career. Lived in Paris most of her life in rue Bréa, with her aunt Jeanne, her mother's sister. In 1988 she retired to Chatte, rue des Jardins, where she died unmarried in 2006.
Great lover of animals especially horses for many years she constantly attended horse shows where she could be seen working as a voluntary groom.

(source: website de Crécy:
F. T. Chaurand @ www.genecrecy.fr/cre_gene/ninon.htm)

In 1935 an article called Paul Baldassera: La Colonne Corinthienne by André Chosalland is published in Cyprus Letters, a monthly magazine of literature and arts edited in Nicosia, Cyprus.
Paul Baldassera (aka Paul Valdaseridis (b. Larnaca 1892-died Athens 1972) was a Greek writer poet who lived in France until 1941.
In 1956 André Chosalland signs in Lisette a short story called Vendetta Corse. Active in Bernadette in 1957-1958.
MADEMOISELLE "PROMET-TOUT", UNE RUSE DE DUGUESDIN, etc.
Le trésor des Lusignan is Chosalland's only bibliographic record (BNF). It was translated in Italian as II tesoro di Cipro, ed. Salani.

COGAN PAUL
French (b.19/1/1921 - d. 31/1/1976)

Pseudonyme de Claude Appell
Auteur de livres pour la jeunesse. Rédacteur en chef de "Terre des jeunes" de 1949 à 1972 (BNF).
Rédacteur en chef de Franc-jeux (journal de jeunes).
Directeur Collection Série 15, Gautier Languereau.

Pierre Joubert - illustrator
(Paris, 27/6/1910- d. La Rochelle 14/1/2002)

"Pierre Joubert est connu pour avoir été l'illustrateur des scouts, de Bob Morane et de Signe de Piste. Si ces trois piliers de son œuvre ont fait sa notoriété, ils n'en sont pas moins les trois arbres qui cachent la forêt…" (cit. www.signe-de-piste.com)

From Wikipedia:
"Élève de l'École des arts appliqués à Paris à partir de ses 14 ans, il rencontre le scoutisme en 1925. En 1927, Paul Coze le remarque dans un camp-école à Chamarande et l'embauche comme illustrateur de la revue le Scout de France. Il devient alors le dessinateur officiel du mouvement. Il travaille ensuite à la revue L'Illustration, mais a aussi participé à l'illustration des couvertures des volumes de la collection Marabout Junior. Il a également écrit plusieurs livres sur de nombreux sujets (autobiographie, l'héraldique), et dessiné de nombreuses illustrations à caractère religieux, historique et scout, des couvertures de livres, des calendriers etc. Il ne cachait pas avoir été proche dans sa jeunesse des Camelots du Roy et de l'Action française dans les années 1930, tout comme Maurice Blanchot, Claude Roy ou François Mitterrand. Cependant, loin de partager les idées d'extrême-droite, il se situait comme chrétien de gauche, loin de l'univers de certains des auteurs qu'il a illustrés. Sa carrière a duré près de 77 ans, au cours de laquelle il a dessiné plusieurs milliers d'œuvres. Après son mariage, il s'installa sur les hauteurs de Meudon, où il résida jusqu'à la fin de sa vie, partageant son temps entre ses voyages, les Charentes et Meudon."

William J. Cowen served in the Canadian Expeditionary Force in WWI, and in France with the Fort Garry Horse. He achieved the rank of Lieutenant & was wounded three times during the course of the war. He was awarded the Military Cross presented by King George V for his actions at the battle of Cambrai, 20 November 1917. After the war, he went to Russia, possibly in the service of the US government, where he was captured by the Bolsheviks, and sentenced to death for being a "spy, bourgeois and a speculator". Returning to the USA, he wrote several books and short stories, notably "Man With Four Lives", which has scenes derived from his war experiences in France, and "They Gave Him a Gun".
In 1926 he married Lenore Jackson Coffee, (1896-1984) succesfull Hollywood screenwriter and director who, from 1910 to the late Fifties directed & scripted more than 80 films. She was a descendant of U.S. General John Coffee, Chief of Staff to Andrew Jackson at the Battle of New Orleans in 1814 (abridged TEXT from gordon.crossley@compaq.com, ©IMDb.com).

Cowen was introduced to the world of cinema by his wife becoming also scriptwriter and film director. His scripts include: "Good Girls Go to Paris" (1939), "Blind Alibi" (1938) and "They Gave Him a Gun" (1937) adapted from his book by the same title.
Beside his books he is remembered for having directed in 1933 a successful film adaptation of "Oliver Twist", the first sound version of Dickens masterpiece.

Coffe and Cowen had a daughter, Toni Cowen and a son Garry Cowen.

Daughter of Jules and Marie Letouzey (or Touzé), the second of four children (Charles, Maria, Jeanne Mathilde Marie and Paul). Her father was a doctor, Professor at the Faculty of Medicine in Paris. He published a study on the use of the oxygen in the treatment of asphyxia and poisoning. He died in 1890 at the age of forty. In 1903, Marie married her contemporary Henry de Crisenoy (b. 28 Sept. 1882 - d. 11 Feb 1930), issued from a well connected aristocratic family from Cherbourg of Army Officers and Governments Officials. (Marie-Marcelle Gigault de Crisenoy Baronne Frédy de Coubertin who died in 1907, was the mother of Pierre de Coubertin; another de Crisenoy married a Montesquiou).
Though she had a book published by Mame in 1925, Maria became a full time writer after the death of her husband. She appears in La Croix in 1933 with Vieux Macaron. She soon became quite popular, especially after receiving a prize from the Académie Française for Au pays des sortilèges, 1935, the biography of Jean de Britto. "Qui ne connaît Mme de Crisenoy?" wrote La Croix in 1937.
She wrote various biographies notably one on Antoine de Saint-Exupéry; Poète et aviateur, Paris, Spes. 1948, another on Pierre Savorgnan de Brazza, le héros du Congo, Paris, Bonne Presse. The book was supported by the personal preface of Thérèse Savorgnan de Brazza who had given Maria access to her husband's papers.
Leur ami, Kid... Roman by baronne Maria de Crisenoy, ed Alsatia, 1946.

(see: Dict. des écrivains français pour la jeunesse 1914-1991 / Nic Diament, 1993)

Cruysmans' other books include:
Les aventures de Bibi-Fricot et de Titi-le-Radis, 1938 - La Face de la terre, 1943 - Le Chant de la colombe, 1943

Collaboration: Fossettes Le Grand Hebdomadaire illustré de la Femme et de la Famille (es 1944).

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