Nathalie Sarraute (1900-1999) was one of the seminal figures in the emergence of France's "Nouveau Roman" ("New Novel") in the 1950s. Her work included not only novels but also plays and influential essays on literary theory.

Nathalie Tcherniak was born in Ivanovo-Voznessensk, Russia, the daughter of a chemist father and a writer mother. The date of her birth was July 18, 1900, but at one point in her career, evidently wishing to cut some years from her age, she gave the year of her birth as 1902, a figure still found in some reference works.

In 1902 her parents were divorced. She left Russia and lived with her mother in Paris, visiting her father for two months each year. In 1906 she and her mother returned to St. Petersburg; for the next two years she spent each summer with her father in France and Switzerland. In 1908 went to live with him and his...