Radio and television man, this loved one Césaire and Marcel Proust, had ensured the correspondence of the “World” in the West Indies. Author of about fifteen books dedicated to the French language, he died on November 17, at the age of 74.
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It was a bridge between the banks of the Loir and the shores of the West Indies, an unlikely union between the world of Marcel Proust and the work of Aimé Césaire, but also a experienced professional of the radio, TV and print media, which distinguished itself, for four decades, on both sides of the Atlantic. Author of fifteen books, “furious crazy words” autoproclamed, Patrice Louis died on November 17, at the age of 74, carried away by a lung cancer, in his home of Illiers-Combray, this Village of Eure-et-Loir, so dear to its favorite writer, where he had residently in 2013, after rolling his bump between France, the West Indies and Africa.
Born on June 10, 1947 in Paris, Patrice Louis studied at the Training Center of Journalists, which he graduated in 1971. He begins as a presenter in Europe 1 before being sent a few years later by his Patron, Etienne Mougeotte, Antilles, where he assures the direction of International Caribbean Radio (RCI). This is where it meets violet Thérèse Ovid, a Martiniquaise who will become his wife.
After these two years in Martinique and Guadeloupe, Patrice Louis regain Paris and the drafting of Europe 1, this time as Chief of Information and then Secretary General of Writing. But his ultramarin Tropism had not said his last word: In 1985, the journalist became the editor of Radio France Overseas (RFO). It will remain two years in this position, before entering the direction of the editorial of France Inter, then at BFM-TV.
“Old accomplice”
Two decades after his departure from the West Indies, Patrice Louis is back in Martinique in 1999. After the radio, the small screen: he succeeds Audrey Pulvar at the information direction of the private chain information Antilles Television. In parallel, it is corresponding for Le Monde as well as for several national channels, including Canal + and TF1.
This second stay overseas will make Patrice Louis a prolific author. After a first work, noise in Landerneau. The proper names in the common speaker (Arléa, 1995), he signs, in a decade, eleven volumes, two of which consecrated to Césaire, the poet Martiniquais, of which, by perseverance, he manages to become the “old accomplice”. But above all, it isolated the French language: its naturalized foreign words, expressions and even its neologisms 2.0. “It’s their story that makes the words fascinating,” he said to the Express in 2004.
At the death of Césaire (2008), Patrice Louis leaves Martinique for Benin. He will remain five years old, the time to publish King Behanzin. Dahomey to Martinique (Arléa, 2011), a work devoted to this African ruler dethroned by the French colonizer and exiled to the West Indies with his court. Cotonou will be his Chemin de Damascus: That’s where he devours to the search for lost time after many unsuccessful attempts. Retired journalist becomes a “proustist” fervent.
“Not like in a dusty museum”
In 2013, Violette and Patrice Louis return to France. And not anywhere: the couple is established at Illiers-Combray, Bourgade of Eure-et-Loir, fief of the Proust family. He holds the blog “The crazy Proust” and publishes, the same year, a novel of the same name. “Here, in Illiers, we still feel the presence of Proust, in August 2015, entrusted the Republican echo. But not like in a dusty museum. Here, everything is alive, we are traversed of sensations.”
The disease was right for Patrice Louis. He commented on the social networks regularly, not without humor and always with a flawless optimism, the evolution of his state of health and, with an infinite gratitude, expected the devoted care that his wife, violet. “I went home!” He announced on his Facebook page on November 16th. The next day, Patrice Louis was no longer.