ABSTRACT

Attempting to define the particular kind of noir sensibility which emerged in post-Second-World-War Paris, James Naremore (1996, 14) lights on Boris Vian (aka ‘Vernon Sullivan’). Several facets of Vian connect with Melville: the adoption of an American pseudonym (Melville was born Jean-Pierre Grumbach); a deep involvement with American culture (in Vian’s case jazz and in Melville’s primarily cinema); the capacity to oscillate between, perhaps to meld, high culture and mass culture; and the association with both surrealism and existentialism.