Author Joseph Ponthus had received the 4th Régine-Deforges Prize for his book A la ligne, evoking his experience at the factory in Brittany.

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R. Delalande / SIPA

He passed away after "a fierce battle" with cancer.

Writer Joseph Ponthus has died at the age of 42, Les Editions de la table ronde reported on Wednesday.

The author, originally from Reims, had come to settle in Brittany to follow his companion there.

This former educator had worked for a long time in the Paris region before landing on the peninsula.

For lack of employment to match his diplomas, the man turned to the agri-food industry.

It is this experience that will inspire her novel A la ligne - Feuillets Factory, published in 2019.

This tale without punctuation, which read more like a rabid poem or a partisan song, had received several literary prizes: the Grand Prix RTL-Lire and the Eugène-Dabit Prize for the populist novel.

Its objective: to make the voice of those who are most often deprived of it heard.

As a temporary worker, Joseph Ponthus will work first in a fish and shrimp processing factory then in a slaughterhouse.

“If one day you have the opportunity to leave everything for love, do not hesitate.

It's the most beautiful thing there is to do in the world, ”he said after the publication of his book.

It is with immense sorrow that we learned of the death last night of Joseph Ponthus, at the age of 42, after a fierce battle with cancer.


Our hearts go out to his wife Krystel and his mother, whose grief we share.

pic.twitter.com/trb8wgvJN2

- LA TABLE RONDE (@edTableRonde) February 24, 2021

This experience had led him to be brought to testify in the highly successful documentary of Anne-Sophie Reinhardt, 

The Damned

, where employees told their daily slaughterhouse.

“They describe what drove them to have to go there and to have their only choice but not to be able to leave.

Say how much this work, comparable to no other, is a source of torment.

It is about psychological wounds, distress and emotional faults, psychological distortions, recurring nightmares, trauma, and in hollow of all the unspoken ”, explained the production at the time of its diffusion in 2020.

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