Claude Arnaud was born in Paris, where he lives. The thesis that he read, in the University of Vincennes, in 1978, was devoted to Vautrin, the key character in la Comédie Humaine, a kind of literary Proteus apt to take on all shapes. By expressing himself through biography, Chamfort (1988, prix de l’Essai de l’Académie française), Cocteau (2003), the novel, Le Caméléon (1994, prix Femina du premier roman), Le Jeu des Quatre coins (1998) and the essay form, Qui dit je en nous (2004, prix Femina de l’Essai), Claude Arnaud is exploring from the labyrinths of a dual, if not elusive identity. In an instructional novel, at the crossroads of these three genres, Qu’as-tu fait de tes frères? (2010), he will have recreated simultaneously his adolescence, the story of his family, with its recurrent tragedies, and that of his generation, scarred by the aftermath of May-68.