Lydie Salvayre

Lydie Salvayre (born Lydie Arjona on 15 March 1946 in Autainville, France) is a French novelist and psychiatrist. The daughter of Spanish Republican refugees who fled Francoist Spain, she grew up near Toulouse, studied literature and then medicine, and worked for years as a child psychiatrist while writing.

Her novels, often mixing dark comedy with social critique of capitalism, include La Déclaration (1990, Prix Hermès), La Compagnie des spectres (1997, Prix Novembre), BW (2009, Prix François-Billetdoux), and Pas pleurer (2014, published in English as Cry, Mother Spain), for which she won the Prix Goncourt. Her work has been translated into around twenty languages.