{{Short description|Belgian fantasy fiction writer and artist}} {{Infobox person | name = Monique Watteau | image = <!-- just the filename, without the File: or Image: prefix or enclosing brackets --> | alt = | caption = | birth_name = Monique Dubois | birth_date = {{Birth date and age|1929|12|23|df=y}} | birth_place = Liège, Belgium | death_date = | death_place = | other_names = {{unbulleted list|Alika Watteau|Alika Lindbergh}} | occupation = Writer, artist | years_active = | known_for = Fantasy fiction, cryptozoological art | notable_works = | spouse = {{unbulleted list|Bernard Heuvelmans (divorced 1961)|Scott Lindbergh (married 1968–1983)}} }}
'''Alika Lindbergh''' (born '''Monique Dubois''', 23 December 1929), commonly known by her former name '''Monique Watteau''', is a Belgian fantasy fiction writer and artist.
==Early life== Watteau was born Monique Dubois<ref name=Mosley>{{citation|last=Mosley|first=Leonard|title=Lindbergh: A Biography|location=Mineola, NY|publisher=Dover Publications|year=2000|page=368|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Hb_CAgAAQBAJ&pg=PA368|isbn=9780486145624}}</ref> in Liège on 23 December 1929. Her father was Hubert Dubois, a playwright and poet with ties to Surrealism.<ref name=Matthys>{{citation|title=Alika Lindbergh, construite pour l'amour fou|first=Francis|last=Matthys|date=15 August 2002|work=La Libre Belgique|url=http://www.lalibre.be/culture/livres/alika-lindbergh-construite-pour-l-amour-fou-51b879d7e4b0de6db9a773d6|access-date=14 March 2015}}</ref>
Watteau studied painting and drawing at the Académie royale des beaux-arts de Liège, and then went on to the Royal Conservatory of Liège to study theatre. At twenty, she left Belgium for Paris, where she met the Belgian scientist Bernard Heuvelmans, famous for his work in cryptozoology.<ref name=Matthys/> In 1951, she appeared under the name Monique Watteau in Jean Anouilh's film {{Interlanguage link|Two Pennies' Worth of Violets|fr|3=Deux sous de violettes|lt=''Two Pennies' Worth of Violets''}}.<ref>{{citation|title=Deux sous de violettes|work=Gaumont.fr|publisher=Gaumont Film Company|url=http://www.gaumont.fr/fr/film/Deux-sous-de-violettes.html|access-date=14 March 2015|year=2013}}</ref> She also worked as a photography model.<ref name=Matthys/>
==Career== Watteau's first novel, ''La colère végétale'', was published in 1954. Critics praised it as a striking literary debut;<ref name=Verthuy/><ref name=Richter/> Albert-Marie Schmidt wrote that Watteau had created "a new kind of fantasy" (''un nouveau fantastique'').<ref name=Richter/> Watteau was reportedly considered for the Prix Goncourt and the Prix Femina, but she was removed from the running of the latter prize in 1954 when the jury discovered that she had posed for nude photographs.<ref name=Matthys/>
Her following novels, ''La nuit aux yeux de bête'' (1956), ''L'ange à fourrure'' (1958), and ''Je suis le ténébreux'' (1962), cemented her reputation as one of the foremost Francophone fantasy writers of the twentieth century.<ref name=Verthuy/> Her work is marked by its sensuality of expression and its ecological, Taoist, and Surrealist themes.<ref name=Verthuy>{{citation|title=Monique Watteau: une éthique prémonitoire|first=Maïr|last=Verthuy|journal=Dalhousie French Studies|volume=64|date=Fall 2003|pages=87–92|jstor=40836843}}</ref> The writer {{Interlanguage link|Anne Richter|fr}} described Watteau's novels as prime examples of feminism in twentieth-century fantasy.<ref name=Richter>{{citation|last=Richter|first=Anne|title=Le fantastique féminin: d'Ann Radcliffe à Patricia Highsmith|location=Brussels|publisher=Complexe|year=1995|pages=21–24|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=w0Yhhr0ztVEC&pg=PA21|isbn=9782870275788}}</ref>
Her first three novels were written under the name Monique Watteau; her fourth gave her name as Monique-Alika Watteau. After its publication, she abandoned the name Monique altogether,<ref name=Verthuy/> going by Alika Watteau<ref name=Wind>{{citation|last1=Lindbergh|first1=Anne Morrow|others=ed. Reeve Lindbergh|title=Against Wind and Tide: Letters and Journals, 1947–1986|location=New York|publisher=Pantheon Books|year=2012|page=240|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=mxZh9z1-9CkC&pg=PA240|isbn=9780307378880}}</ref> and later Alika Lindbergh.<ref name=Verthuy/>
After publishing four novels, she turned to painting as a career.<ref name=Verthuy/> Her output as a painter includes a notable corpus of cryptozoological art,<ref>{{citation|last1=Coleman|first1=Loren|first2=Jerome|last2=Clark|title=Cryptozoology A to Z: The Encyclopedia of Loch Monsters, Sasquatch, Chupacabras, and Other Authentic Mysteries of Nature|location=New York|publisher=Simon & Schuster|year=1999|page=208|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=4ZTgX7BZXqoC&pg=PA208|isbn=9780684856025}}</ref> including her work as the primary illustrator of Bernard Heuvelmans's books.<ref name=Verthuy/> When the cartoonist Hergé, researching ''Tintin in Tibet'', asked Heuvelmans for details on the yeti, Watteau supplied a "graphic reconstitution" of the creature for Hergé's reference.<ref>{{citation|last=Peeters|first=Benoît|others=trans. Tina A. Kover|title=Hergé, Son of Tintin|location=Baltimore|publisher=Johns Hopkins University Press|year=2012|page=272|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=eS5v-F04AoQC&pg=PA272|isbn=9781421404547}}</ref>
In the 1970s, Watteau published two new books, ''Nous sommes deux dans l'Arche'' et ''Quand les singes hurleurs se tairont''.<ref name=Matthys/> She published an autobiographical work, ''Le testament d'une fée'', in 2002.<ref name=Verthuy/>
Watteau also worked as an animal rights activist.<ref name=Wind/> In the early 1990s, she was the president of the Cercle national pour la défense de la vie, de la nature, et de l'animal (CNDVNA), a conservation advocacy group within the French National Front.<ref>{{citation|last=Davies|first=Peter|title=The National Front in France: Ideology, Discourse and Power|location=London|publisher=Routledge|year=1999|page=110|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=kjhHdMBp_IwC&pg=PA110|isbn=9781134725304}}</ref>
==Personal life== Heuvelmans was Watteau's first husband;<ref name=Verthuy/> they divorced in 1961,<ref name=Matthys/> but remained friends and collaborators.<ref name=Verthuy/> According to her autobiography, Watteau was romantically involved with actor Yul Brynner from 1961 to 1967.<ref name=Matthys/> It was after this affair that she changed her first name to Alika, which she and Brynner had used as her ''nom d'amour''.<ref name=Sykes>{{citation|title=Bigfoot, Yeti, and the Last Neanderthal: A Geneticist's Search for Modern Apemen|first=Bryan|last=Sykes|location=Newburyport, MA|publisher=Disinformation Books|year=2016|page=70|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=uoRNCwAAQBAJ&pg=PA70}}</ref>
She married zoologist Scott Lindbergh,<ref name=Matthys/> son of aviator Charles Lindbergh, in 1968.<ref name=Mosley/> In 1972, Lindbergh and Watteau established a grant-funded primate research center on an 82-acre estate in the Dordogne valley in France, where they raised and studied dozens of South American monkeys.<ref>{{citation|title=Son Says Lindbergh Lived for Future|work=The Hartford Courant|date=4 May 1977|page=23}}</ref> Watteau and Lindbergh separated in 1983.<ref name=Matthys/>
During Watteau's marriage to Lindbergh, the couple arranged for Heuvelmans, then in poverty, to live in a small house on the grounds of the Dordogne estate.<ref name=Sykes/> Watteau attended to Heuvelmans during his final years,<ref name=Coleman>{{citation|last=Coleman|first=Loren|title=Bernard Heuvelmans (1916–2001)|work=The Anomalist|year=2001|url=http://www.anomalist.com/milestones/Heuvelmans.html|access-date=14 March 2015}}</ref> and was with him at his death in 2001.<ref name=Matthys/> In accordance with his last wishes, Watteau was in charge of his private funeral in Le Vésinet.<ref name=Coleman/>
==List of works== The following list comprises the original publications of Watteau's works. Because Watteau used multiple names, each entry includes the name under which the work was published.
===As writer=== *Monique Watteau, ''La colère végétale'' (Paris: Plon, 1954)<ref name=Verthuy/> *Monique Watteau, ''La nuit aux yeux de bête'' (Paris: Plon, 1956)<ref name=Verthuy/> *Monique Watteau, ''L'ange à fourrure'' (Paris: Plon, 1958)<ref name=Verthuy/> *Monique-Alika Watteau, ''Je suis le ténébreux'' (Paris: Julliard, 1962)<ref name=Verthuy/> *Alika Lindbergh, ''Nous sommes deux dans l'arche'' (Paris: Presses de la Cité, 1975)<ref>{{citation|title=Nous sommes deux dans l'arche|work=WorldCat|oclc=417468937}}</ref> *Alika Lindbergh, ''Quand les singes hurleurs se tairont'' (Paris: Presses de la Cité, 1976)<ref>{{citation|title=Quand les singes hurleurs se tairont|work=WorldCat|oclc=417657398}}</ref> *Alika Lindbergh, ''Le testament d'une fée'' (Paris: E-dite, 2002)<ref name=Verthuy/> *Alika Lindbergh, "Préface," in Bernard Marck, ''Lindbergh, l'ange noir'' (Paris: L'Archipel, 2006)<ref>{{citation|title=Lindbergh, l'ange noir|work=WorldCat|oclc=254970335}}</ref> *Alika Lindbergh, "Préface," in Jean-Jacques Barloy, ''Bernard Heuvelmans, un rebelle de la science'' (Paris: Oeil du sphinx, 2007)<ref>{{citation|title=Bernard Heuvelmans, un rebelle de la science|work=WorldCat|oclc=173273754}}</ref>
===As illustrator=== *Hubert Dubois, ''Le danseur du sacre: poèmes'', frontispiece by Monique Watteau (Brussels: Éditions des artistes, 1953)<ref>{{citation|title=Le danseur du sacre|work=WorldCat|oclc=37592440}}</ref> *André Romus, ''Voix dans le labyrinthe'', frontispiece by Monique Watteau (Paris: Éditions James, P.J. Oswald, 1954)<ref>{{citation|title=Voix dans le labyrinthe|work=WorldCat|oclc=77968715}}</ref> *Bernard Heuvelmans, ''Sur la piste des bêtes ignorées'', illustrations by Monique Watteau (Paris: Plon, 1955)<ref>{{citation|title=Sur la piste des bêtes ignorées|work=WorldCat|oclc=459306408}}</ref> *Bernard Heuvelmans, ''Dans le sillage des monstres marins'', Vol. I, ''Le kraken et le poulpe colossal'', illustrations by Monique Watteau (Paris: Plon, 1958)<ref>{{citation|title=Dans le sillage des monstres marins|work=WorldCat|oclc=491862476}}</ref> *Edward Lear, ''Le hibou et la poussiquette'', translated by Francis Steegmuller, illustrated by Monique-Alika Watteau (London: Hart-Davis, 1961)<ref>{{citation|title=Le hibou et la poussiquette|work=WorldCat|oclc=1860989}}</ref> *Bernard Heuvelmans, ''Le grand serpent-de-mer: le problème zoologique et sa solution: histoire des bêtes ignorées de la mer'', illustrated by Alika Watteau (Paris: Plon, 1965)<ref>{{citation|title=Le grand serpent-de-mer|work=WorldCat|oclc=716189471}}</ref> *Albert Jeannin, ''En vacances avec l'oncle Antoine'', four volumes, illustrated by Alika Watteau (Lausanne: Rencontre, 1967)<ref>{{citation|title=En vacances avec l'oncle Antoine|work=WorldCat|oclc=80426632}}</ref> *Bernard Heuvelmans, ''Les derniers dragons d'Afrique'', illustrated by Alika Lindbergh (Paris: Plon, 1978)<ref>{{citation|title=Les derniers dragons d'Afrique|work=WorldCat|oclc=461670058}}</ref> *Bernard Heuvelmans, ''Les bêtes humaines d'Afrique'', illustrated by Alika Lindbergh (Paris: Plon, 1980)<ref>{{citation|title=Les bêtes humaines d'Afrique|work=WorldCat|oclc=8132920}}</ref> *Jean-Léo, ''Histoire illustrée du cirque à Bruxelles: saltimbanques et gens du voyage depuis le dix-septième siècle'', illustrations by Alika Lindbergh and others (Brussels: Archives générales du Royaume, 1998)<ref>{{citation|title=Histoire illustrée du cirque à Bruxelles|work=WorldCat|oclc=762866910}}</ref>
===Other works=== <!--in addition to these, Watteau seems to have painted at least one tarot deck—but clear information on this, such as when it was first released and whether there were more than one, is so elusive in online sources that I've left it off the list for now --> *Ian Cameron, ''Le cimetière des cachalots'', translated from the English by Alika Watteau (Paris: Laffont, 1966)<ref>{{citation|title=Le cimetière des cachalots|work=WorldCat|oclc=850985663}}</ref> *Allain Bougrain-Dubourg, ''L'agonie des bébés phoques'', contributions by Alika Lindbergh and others (Paris: Presses de la Cité, 1978)<ref>{{citation|title=L'agonie des bébés phoques|work=WorldCat|oclc=4514031}}</ref> *''Regards croisés: collectif d'artistes peintres animaliers: Zsuzsa Farkas, Alika Lindbergh, István Nemes'', catalogue for a Musée Cantonal de Zoologie exhibition of paintings by Lindbergh and others, 17 March to 19 May 2002 (Lausanne: Musée cantonal de zoologie, 2002)<ref>{{citation|title=Regards croisés|work=WorldCat|oclc=84689134}}</ref>
==References== {{reflist|20em}}
==External links== * {{IMDb name|0913929}} * {{LCAuth|n2004040064|Monique Watteau|3|ue}} * [http://lccn.loc.gov/n2004040063 Alika Lindbergh] at LC Authorities, with 3 records
{{Authority control (arts)}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:Watteau, Monique}} Category:1929 births Category:Living people Category:20th-century Belgian novelists Category:French-language Belgian writers Category:20th-century Belgian illustrators Category:21st-century Belgian illustrators Category:Women science fiction and fantasy writers Category:Belgian science fiction writers Category:Belgian fantasy writers Category:Belgian science fiction artists Category:Belgian fantasy artists Category:Writers from Liège Category:Belgian women novelists Category:21st-century Belgian novelists Category:20th-century Belgian women writers Category:21st-century Belgian women writers Category:Artists from Liège Category:Belgian Buddhists