John Antoine Nau - Prix Goncourt

Prix Goncourt

In 1903 a group writers gathered in Paris (J. K. Huysmans, Octave Mirbeau, Léon Daudet, the brothers Rosny, Paul Marguerite, Lucien Desclaves, Élémir Bourges, Léon Hennique, Gustave Geffroy) and awarded Enemy Force the first Prix Goncourt (by a vote of 6 to 4). Edmond de Goncourt had stipulated in his will that they would award a prose work of imagination to distinguish and support a young literary debut full of promise. He rested in peace that first year. Nau was 43 years old. The author was almost completely unknown, except for a very few exotic stories in La Revue Blanche. He was living in Saint Tropez at the time and didn’t even return to Paris to claim his prize money. His "outsider" status irked many a critic, but it only increased his status among the jury and other, younger writers. In 1906 Paul Léautraud: “The Prix Goncourt has really only been given once—the first time to Nau”. And years later Huysmans would say, “It was the best one that we ever crowned.”