Vanessa Springora’s memoir, Consent, became an instant, international literary sensation when it was published in France. Her beautifully written, intimate and powerful description of her relationship in the mid-1980s with the French author Gabriel Matzneff, when she was fourteen and he fifty, is a beautifully written universal #MeToo story of power, manipulation, trauma, resilience and healing. Award-winning translator, Natasha Lehrer, captures Springora’s changes in pace and in tone, the voices and the silences, the literary milieu then and now with a sensitive ear and lexical deftness.
Category: Spotlight on Publishing
the insider
Spotlight | La Familia Grande, Camille Kouchner | Éditions du Seuil
The publication of La Familia Grande by Camille Kouchner reveals how incest is everpresent at the highest levels of French society, even among the most glamorous, powerful, bohemian, left wing intellectual Parisian élite, known as “la gauche caviar” (champagne socialists). In France, one in ten people say they are victims of incest according to Ipsos.
Camille Kouchner is the daughter of the late feminist, political scientist and lecturer Évelyne Pisier, and Bernard Kouchner, co-founder of the medical charity Médecins Sans Frontières and Minister of Foreign and European Affairs under President Nicolas Sarkozy, having previously been a minister during Mitterand’s presidency. In 2010, the Jerusalem Post considered Bernard Kouchner the fifteenth most influential Jew in the world.
Continue reading Spotlight | La Familia Grande, Camille Kouchner | Éditions du Seuil
Review | Vernon Subutex 3, Virginie Despentes | MacLehose Press
Look who’s back! Vernon Subutex: DJ guru of the nineteenth arrondissement. He is still homeless in Paris and more Peter Pan than ever. We first met him at the turn of the millenium as he was losing his record shop, flat and material possessions after his friend and benefactor, the rock star Alex Bleach, died of a drug overdose in a hotel bedroom.
Film producer turned sex predator, Laurent Dropalet, is desperate to find compromising videos revealing the truth about the death of his porn-star mistress recorded by Alex Bleach. He hires the Hyena, a tech whiz and ravening lesbian to track down the tapes (and therefore Vernon who has them); she switches allegiances to join the DJ and his cohorts.
Continue reading Review | Vernon Subutex 3, Virginie Despentes | MacLehose Press
Podcast LIVE | Wrapping up Bridging the Divide: Translation and the Art of Empathy | season 2
Hello, hello!
The second season of our weekly BookBlast Podcast series Bridging the Divide: Translation and the Art of Empathy went out in September. Our audience loved the first seven podcasts in the series so here’s the next eight for you to discover if you have not already done so!
The hosts, Georgia de Chamberet and Lucy Popescu, interview leading independent publishers, their award-winning or up-and-coming authors and highly creative translators filling a unique niche in showcasing inner and outer worlds, enriching our literary culture. Reviews of the books are featured in online journal, The BookBlast Diary.
So tune in and come on a literary adventure : it’s perfect to get you through lockdown 2.
Continue reading Podcast LIVE | Wrapping up Bridging the Divide: Translation and the Art of Empathy | season 2
Podcast LIVE | Update: Bridging the Divide: Translation and the Art of Empathy | season 1
Hello, hello!
Since the first seven episodes of our weekly series Bridging the Divide: Translation and the Art of Empathy went live in July, there are still eight episodes to look forward to. The hosts, Georgia de Chamberet and Lucy Popescu, interview independent publishers, their authors and highly creative translators filling a unique niche in showcasing myriad inner and outer worlds thereby enriching our literary culture.
When reading, do you “hear” the book as if it is being read to you by the author?
The voice tells us so much about a person. Where they come from, their personality and how they’re feeling. As important as the voices in writers’ heads are those that are heard by readers. Hearing authors and translators talk describe their vision and craft in our Bridging the Divide series will enhance your reading of their books.
Catch up, listen up!
Interview | J.S. Margot, author of the memoir Mazel Tov
What happens when a young Flemish woman at university in Antwerp teaches the four children of an Orthodox Jewish family to earn a bit of extra money? How does her first great love for an Iranian political refugee evolve? Read Henrietta Foster’s review HERE
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