Conrad Detrez

Conrad Detrez (1 April 1937 Roclenge-sur-Geer – 11 February 1985 Paris) was a Belgian (from 1982 on French) journalist, diplomat and novelist.
Biography.
Conrad Detrez grew up in a small village in the Belgian countryside. In 1962 he traveled to Brazil as a lay missionary. He first stayed in Volta Redonda and from 1963 in Rio de Janeiro. He was a university teacher while at the same time working in the favelas. He discovered his homosexuality and gradually became involved in the resistance to the military dictatorship that was installed in 1964 in Brazil.
After being arrested and expulsed from Rio de Janeiro in 1967, Detrez stayed some months in Paris, participating in the revolt of May 68. He returned to São Paulo where he became a journalist. In 1969 he secretly met and interviewed Brazilian guerrilla leader Carlos Marighella.
In the 1970's Detrez stayed in Algeria (as a teacher) and in Lisbon (as a radio journalist) after the Portuguese Carnation Revolution.
Before his writing career Detrez translated books by the Brazilian writers Jorge Amado and Antonio Callado. In 1978 he won the Prix Renaudot for his autobiographical novel "L'Herbe à brûler".
In 1982 Detrez became a diplomat for the French government in Nicaragua. He died of AIDS.
Critical reception.
Poet James Kirkup found "Le dragueur de Dieu" 'beautifully written in a fluent, lucid and visionary manner' and praised the mixture of religious sensuality and intellectual mysticism. 'Writers in other countries seem able to reconcile sexual and religious themes in their works in a way that is rarely found in English or American authors.'
Lydia Davis translated two of Detrez's novels into English. "A weed for burning" was labeled in the "Los Angeles Times" an 'extremely ambitious novel'. 'Detrez is still an unfinished writer,' claimed "Time Magazine". 'But he has a sense of the appropriate image and the right valedictory tone.' "The Village Voice" praised his 'effectiveness as a storyteller'.
Chilean historian Rafael Pedemonte calls Detrez 'a thrilling figure, unfairly forgotten after his premature death'.