Monsieur Bébé

Raymond Radiguet exploited Cocteau's love for him and left a trail of destruction in his wake.

Raymond Radiguet (cracking a rare smile) and Jean Cocteau, c. 1921-22

Bébé est vicieuse. Il aime les femmes.

Jean Cocteau’s greatest heartbreak came at the hands of a teenager who grew up quickly, lived fast, and died young.

In his short time on earth, he exploited the affections of the older celebrity; published a novel that was called the “most immoral since Les Liaisons dangereuses”; was the center of what is considered to be the first ever literary publicity campaign; garnered a monthly stipend of what would be, in today’s currency, roughly $3000/month; inspired one of the most enduring and iconic pieces of jewelry on the market; and seduced Picasso, Brancusi and Modigliani’s muses away from them.

His funeral was arranged by Misia Sert, paid for by Coco Chanel, and the grief stemming from his premature and sudden death – at age twenty – plunged Cocteau into the opium addiction that would plague him for the rest of his life.

Which inspires the question: who was Raymond Radiguet and how did this happen?

Born in 1903, died in 1923, Raymond Radiguet was something between a literary child and rock star. One of seven siblings, he used the relative neglect of his parents as an excuse to sneak into Paris from the suburb he grew up in, which is where he was able to integrate himself into the creative community – then booming in the wake of the Armistice – at a very fast pace. His extreme youth (he first met and became friends with Jean Cocteau and his circle when he was barely 16 years old) was exceeded only by his beauty, which Igor Stravinsky called “disturbing,” in terms of what initially garnered him attention from the then-thirty year old Cocteau.

Cocteau fell hard, and he fell fast. Sensitive, fragile and big-hearted, this wasn’t atypical of him. However, the depth to which he fell was new. Radiguet certainly stirred in Cocteau bigger feelings, ones which his friends were quick to comment on, in addition to Radiguet’s literary prowess – which Cocteau encouraged and mentored.

Radiguet was able to get Cocteau under his thumb with relative ease by employing one of the oldest tricks in the book: emotional neglect. Alas, Cocteau was, by all means, a victim of an all too common situation – falling in love with an emotionally unavailable man. Radiguet’s general frostiness only served to make Cocteau all the more obsessed with him, and while there is a wealth of surviving letters sent to Radiguet by Cocteau, few responses remain registered.