Born in Lausanne, Maurice Chappaz spent his childhood between Martigny and the abbey of Le Châble, in the Swiss canton of Valais. Born of a family of lawyers and solicitors, nephew of Valaisian secretary of State Maurice Troillet, he studied at Saint-Maurice Abbey High School, then he registered first in Law School at the University of Lausanne, but quickly left it to study littérature in the University of Geneva, which he also left a few months later.
