Clarens, Switzerland

Notable people

• Élisée Reclus a renowned French geographer, writer and anarchist resided in Clarens from 1872
• Tchaikovsky the Russian composer of the romantic period, wrote his Violin Concerto in Clarens in 1878, it is one of the best known violin concertos ever written.
• Igor Stravinsky, the Russian composer, lived in Clarens during the summers of 1910 to 1915. He composed his ballets The Rite of Spring and Pulcinella here.

• David Urquhart a Scottish diplomat, writer and politician, MP for Stafford 1847 to 1852, introduced the Turkish bath to Britain, lived in Clarens from 1864 and is buried here.
• Paul Kruger, ex-President of the Transvaal Republic up to and including the Second Boer War, lived his final year in self-imposed exile in Clarens after escaping from South Africa, and died there. Clarens, Free State, a small town in South Africa, was named in his honor.
• Johannes van Laar, a Dutch chemist who is best known for the equations regarding chemical activity.

• Sydney Chaplin, an English actor and the elder half-brother of Sir Charlie Chaplin. He died in Nice and was buried in Clarens.
• Oskar Kokoschka, an Austrian artist, poet and playwright of expressionistic portraits and landscapes, lived in Montreux from 1947 to 1980, where he died. He is buried in Clarens.
• Vladimir Nabokov, a Russian-born novelist, poet, translator and entomologist; in 1961 he and Véra moved from the United States to Montreux, where he subsequently died. He is buried in Clarens.

  Education

Photo gallery