Francis Lacassin dies, reports De Papieren Man.

Edith Scob, at her father’s masked ball in Judex (Franju, 1963), sourced here[2]

Francis Lacassin, (November 18 1931 in Saint-Jean-de-Valériscle (Gard), France – August 12, 2008, Paris), was a French journalist, publisher, writer, screenwriter and essayist.

From 1964 onwards he contributed to the literary magazine Bizarre, published by Jean-Jacques Pauvert. He wrote on fantastic literature and detective fiction for Magazine Littéraire, and contributed to l’Express and Point.

He was also the literary advisor for Christian Bourgois‘s 10/18 series.

Connoisseur of popular culture, he was instrumental in giving comic books (already more respectfully known as bandes dessinées in France), its respectability as the ninth art and was a contributor to the film magazine Midi Minuit Fantastique and a co-screenwriter to Franju‘s Judex.

He prepared and prefaced a great many reference works, author profiles or series, most notably at Éditions Robert Laffont where he supervised the series « Bouquins » since 1982 including Eugène Sue, Gustave Le Rouge, Maurice Leblanc, Fantômas, Lovecraft and Jack London.

He was nicknamed the “man of a thousand prefaces”.