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A meeting with Ella Balaert, author. This event is part of the DIXIT meetings on art and history, organized by the 10th arrondissement town hall with the support of Histoire et Vies du 10e
On October 4, 1926, Léona Delcourt, alias Nadja, fortuitously met André Breton on rue La Fayette. She became the heroine of the eponymous novel by the "pope of surrealism," published as early as 1928, but her own writings and drawings have only just been published.
In Léona D. The Hidden Woman Behind the Myth of Nadja (Éditions des femmes - Antoinette Fouque, 2026), Ella Balaert resurrects the forgotten figure of this iconic muse. Blending personal narrative and biographical research drawing on Léona Delcourt's letters, the author explores the female condition of the time and the singular life of Léona, an inspired and inspiring rebel, institutionalized for thirteen years in an asylum until her death in 1941.
Ella Balaert is a novelist, short story writer, playwright, and poet. She has published about twenty books, including the short story collection, Red Fish and Other Beasts Just as Ferocious (des femmes - Antoinette Fouque, 2020) crowned with the Boccaccio Prize 2021.
A graduate of the École Normale Supérieure with agrégation, she has held various positions before devoting herself entirely to literature through the workshops she leads and associations of authors.
Price: Community Hall - Free Entry
Source: paris.fr — photo: Bibliothèque littéraire Jacques Doucet, Paris