Le dictateur et le hamac

Daniel Pennac, whose real name is Daniel Pennacchioni, was born on December 1, 1944 in Casablanca, Morocco. He was the fourth and youngest of a tribe of boys. His father was in the military. The family followed him on his travels abroad – Africa, Asia, Europe – and in France, particularly in the village of La Colle-sur-Loup, in the Alpes-Maritimes. When he talks about his father, he compares him to reading: “For me, the pleasure of reading is linked to the smokescreen that my father surrounded himself with to read his books. And he was just waiting for one thing, for people to come around him, to sit down and read with him, and that’s what we were doing." Daniel spent part of his schooling in boarding school, only returning home at the end of the term. Of his school years he says: "I was a bad student, convinced that I would never get my baccalaureate." However, thanks to his years at boarding school, he developed a taste for reading. Children were not allowed to read there, as he mentions in "Comme un roman": "So reading was then a subversive act. The discovery of the novel was added to the excitement of disobedience...".
His studies in literature led him to teaching, from 1969 to 1995, in middle schools and then high schools, in Soissons and Paris.
His first book, written in 1973 after his military service, is a pamphlet that attacks the great myths that constitute the essence of national service: equality, virility, maturity. He then becomes Daniel Pennac, changing his name so as not to harm his father.
In 1979, Daniel Pennac spent two years in Brazil, which would be the source of a novel published twenty-three years later: "Le Dictateur et le hamac".
In the Série Noire, he published in 1985, "Au bonheur des ogres", the first part of the saga of the Malaussène tribe (of which we will find the "little one" in "Kamo. L'idée du siècle").
Daniel Pennac continues his tetralogy with "La Fée Carabine" then "La petite marchande de prose" and "Monsieur Malaussène" (he has since added "Aux fruits de la passion").
He diversifies his audience with another tetralogy for children, featuring heroes close to the world of children, concerned with school and friendship: "Kamo, l'agence Babel", "Kamo et moi", "L'évasion de Kamo" and "Kamo, l'idée du siècle".
Are these novels the fruit of personal memories? "Kamo is the school transformed into a dream of school, or a dream school, your choice."
In addition to these fictions, there are other types of works: an essay on reading, "Comme un roman", two works in collaboration with the photographer Robert Doisneau and "La débauche", a comic strip, with Jacques Tardi.
He retired from teaching in 1995 to devote himself entirely to literature. However, he continues to have contact with students by visiting classes regularly.