Jacqueline Rivière

Jacqueline Rivière (8 May 1851 – 20 February 1920) was the pseudonym of a French writer, newspaper editor-in-chief and creator of the successful comic strip Bécassine.

Born Jeanne Josephine Spallarossa, 8 May 1851 in Brive-la-Gaillarde, France, she signed her first novels under the pseudonyms Bernard La Roche, Mrs. Bernard de Laroche, Bernard de Laroche or Mrs. Alexandre Bernhardt. In 1902, she adopted the pen name of Jacqueline Rivière, by which she has become most widely known.

Personal life Jeanne Josephine's father was Jean Baptiste Spallarossa, an officer from Bastia on the French island of Corsica who was a Legion of Honor recipient. He married Elisabeth Marie Martine de Gilbert de Merlhiac in 1848. Jeanne Josephine had four siblings, brothers Nicolas Guillaume (b. Blois, 1849) and Edouard Jean Charles (b. Paris, 1863) and sisters Marie Elisabeth Augustine and Aimable Elizabeth Angèle (b. Colmar, 1854). Their father died in 1863.

On 7 June 1887 in Vincennes, France, Jeanne Josephine married a civil engineer and general insurance inspector Alexandre Bernhardt (b. 1832, Paris). Their daughter, named Suzanne (b. 1882), was five years old at the time. The couple divorced in 1899. )

Writings The writer was a prolific novelist before, during and after her marriage. She had come to know publisher Henri Gautier during that time and when he was ready to launch a new weekly newspaper for young well-to-do girls called La Semaine de Suzette (The Week of Suzette), he asked Rivière to take the helm as its first editor-in-chief. As part of that job, she created of the text comic series called Bécassine as well as a popular advice column, both published in her newspaper.

Comic creator

According to the newspaper's archives, Rivière was having problems with the first issue on 2 February 1905; the pending newspaper had one empty page that had to be completed before the premiere edition could be sent off for printing. However, the author of the piece that was scheduled to be placed there had fallen ill, and as editor-in-chief Rivière searched for something to fill the blank space. As David Hopkin says, it is believed that she quickly wrote the text for a new comic strip that would become exceedingly popular about a simple house maid named Bécassine who had come to Paris from the Brittany region of northwestern France and was helping with dinner preparations. “According to an oft repeated story, [the character’s] origin lay in an actual blunder made by the Breton maid of the magazine’s editor, Jacqueline Rivière. As depicted in that first 1905 issue, Bécassine is given orders to notify the marchioness [the lady of the house] when a lobster is delivered for the evening’s dinner party. But as Bécassine does not know what a lobster is, the marchioness tells her that it is red, that she is to check if it is fresh and to put it in the kitchen. Instead, Bécassine puts the dinner guests, four colonial officers in their red uniforms, in the kitchen, and informs the marchioness that there are three little lobsters and one large one (the colonel), but that the latter is not quite fresh!” Newspaper readers responded positively to the weekly adventures of the little Breton girl who journeyed to Paris to find work and became a comic book hero for doing so. The series, according to Yves Frémion, made Rivière "the first screenwriter of French comics."

Advice columnist In addition to the comic section, Rivière started a popular advice column that ran weekly in the same newspaper (La Semaine de Suzette); she signed it Tante Jacqueline ("Aunt Jacqueline"). There, Rivière answered questions sent from readers and her advice often encouraged the female readers to be polite and obedient, which was standard advice given at the time to young ladies. The Tante Jacqueline column proved to be extremely popular and was continued by numerous editors for many decades after Rivière passed on authorship to others. (The newspaper La Semaine de Suzette was printed by the same publisher from 2 February 1905 until 6 June 1940 and again from 30 May 1946 to 25 August 1960.)

Novelist The author wrote 15 novels under the pen names Bernard La Roche or Bernard de Laroche that were published from 1878 to 1900. )

Paris héroïque (Heroic Paris), by Bernard de Laroche. Limoges: M. Barbou, 1886 Les Femmes malheureuses (Unhappy Women) by Raoul de Navery (pen name of Mme E. Chervet) and Bernard de Laroche. Paris: H. Gautier, 1889 Béatrice (Beatrice), by Bernard de Laroche. Limoges: M. Barbou, 1900 La filleule des abeilles (The Goddaughter of Bees), by Jacqueline Rivière, 1900. (Ninth edition Paris: Gautier and Languereau, 1950) L'Erreur (The Mistake), by Jacqueline Rivière. Paris: H. Gautier, 1905 La Maison des yeux bleus (The House of Blue Eyes), by Jacqueline Rivière. Paris: H. Gautier, 1908 Le Jouet (The Toy), by Jacqueline Rivière. Paris: H. Gautier, 1913 Le Bois-Chantant (The Singing Wood), new edition. by Jacqueline Rivière pseud. of Bernard de Laroche Paris: Gautier and Languereau, 1920 Le Hameau du trésor-perdu (The Hamlet of the Lost Treasure), by Jacqueline Rivière. Paris: H. Gautier, 1920 Bonne Maman (Good Mom), by Jacqueline Rivière. Paris: Gautier and Languereau, 1926 Le Piège (The Trap), by Jacqueline Rivière, 1926