The "Rentrée littéraire"

The "show" must go on.

Especially after the Paris events.

We will be back at the Cornelia Street Cafe on Wednesday 12/2  at 6pm sharp

with a very French program dedicated to the "Rentrée littéraire", 

this special moment in September 

when editors publish hundreds of novels 

they think are going to pop to the top of the charts.  

And they are right !

We will read 

One excerpt from 

One excerpt from 

and one excerpt from

As well as excerpts from

and

None of these very new titles have been translated yet, 

but Emmanuelle Ertel's NYU students 

will translate the excerpts we picked

and we will perform a bilingual reading as usual of those excerpts.

Come and join us for this celebration of very recent French contemporary novels.

It will be our last evening, we definitely need you 

and we thank you all for your long and faithful support

See below pictures from our former evening.

Série Noire or The dark soul of French literature

We are back and we will be happy to see you 

on Wednesday 10/7 at 6pm 

at our usual spot - The Cornelia Street Cafe in New York

This first evening of the Fall will be devoted 

to the French detective stories 

that we call "polars" or "romans noirs".

We selected three of them 

among the huge number 

French detective stories writers published.

We will start by a master piece :  Ô Dinguos, Ô chateaux 

by Jean-Patrick Manchette (1942-1995) 

for which he won an award in 1973. 

The book has been lately translated into English by David Nicholson-Smith 

who won the French-American Foundation Translation Prize for Fiction.

The novel was released in English under the title The Mad and the Bad. It is a violent road movie in France in which a young woman, Julie, who just got out of a psychiatric hospital tries to escape and protect the child she is supposed to look after from a young hired killer, Thompson is supposed to kill them. 

This is the cover of Jean Tardi's graphic novel adapted from The Mad and the Bad

We will go on with a novel written by Karim Miské - Arab Jazz - 

which takes place in one of the multicultural district of Paris 

where Ahmed Taroudant gets involved 

in an investigation about the terrifying murder of Laura Vignole, 

his top floor neighbor. 

Published in 2012, the novel won two awards 

in France and has just been translated into English.

Last but not least, Emmanuelle Ertel's NYU students

 will read the translation they just finished 

of a short story by Emmanuel Grand - Pavillon rouge à La Baule - 

which was published this summer 

by "Le Monde", The French New York Times, 

in its short detective stories collection - "Les petits polars". 

In a sea resort called La Baule, 

a woman during her morning run 

found a body of a drowned man 

who was probably helped to die.

We hope you come and join us for a thrilling French thrillers night

Jean-Patrick Manchette

Karim Miské                       

Emmanuel Grand

Our next French night will host a play by Philippe Malone, 

http://www.theatre-video.net/video/Septembres-de-Philippe-Malone-Le-contexte-artistique

a french writer and photographer 

who works a lot in urban and peri-urban neighborhood.

He has written 15 plays, 

some of which were preformed on stage and on radio. 

The titles reveal his concern 

about the issues our consumers society brings up. 

- Septembres - Krach - 

Lost in a supermarket - Bien lotis

Bien lotis, 2013,  the play we are going to read on stage, 

is a "peri-urban epic", a "social comedy" 

which is based on the interview of a couple

 who lived in a project and then moved to their own private house, 

as their financial and social situation improved. 

"Bien lotis", which is almost impossible to translate, 

means that

they had a good house and

that they were successful 

and got their part of the cake. 

http://victoregea.fr/?fluxus_portfolio=bien-lotis

The play has 40 short scenes  which "attempt to highlight the great peri-urban epic through a blend of quizzes, commentaries and flashbacks briskly conducted by a journalist."
http://entractes.sacd.fr/en/oeuvre_print.php?idoeuvre=670

http://victoregea.fr/?fluxus_portfolio=bien-lotis

 Emmanuelle Ertel's Translation workshop students 

will translate part of the play for the evening.

Don't miss it

Please come and join us for a new french night

on Wednesday April 22

at 6 pm

at the Cornelia Street Cafe

28 Cornelia Street, NY 

Subway- W 4th

on 1,  2, 3, A, C, E

Patrick Modiano at the Cornelia Street Cafe- 2/25/15

We were thrilled to dedicate 

our latest French Night to Patrick Modiano’s novels.

Patrick Modiano was born in 1945.

He wrote his first novel when he was 22

and never stopped writing.
His bibliography includes almost 30 books. 

He received the Nobel Prize of Literature in 2014

just after publishing his latest novel. 

We enjoyed having

 old friends 

and new ones

new readers

and old ones

new translators and old ones

who came to join us despite the cold and the snow.

We picked three of Patrick Modiano's novels 
to follow him through his entire career. 

The first one was

 published in 1978 for which he received the Goncourt Award - 

one of the most famous awards in France since 1903. 

This novel was translated in 2005 by Daniel Weissbort 

and published by Verba Mundi

The second one was

This novel was published in 2008 

Its translation is by Chris Clarke 

and will be published 

by NYRB Classics in February 2016.

And last but not least, 

His latest novel

It was

published in September 2014 by Gallimard. 

Some excerpts were translated by 

Emmanuelle Ertel's translation workshop students 

 in NYU.

We got started by excerpts of  In The Cafe of lost Youth 

 read by Chris Clarke its translator and Frédéric-Charles Baitinger

Louki is the character people are looking for. 

Her husband hires a detective 

and we follow him in the second chapter of the novel

In the two last chapters of the book, the search goes on when 

one of Louki's partner tries to find her.

They scour Paris, going from place to place 

looking for Louki where she has been and where she might be,

but they never find her.

We went on with

 Rue des Boutiques Obscures,

 whose title in French is so captivating.

 Richard Normandon read in French

as Tom Radigan read the English translation

As in many of his other novels, we follow the search of a missing person,

 but this time the narrator, Guy Roland, is looking for himself. 

He has no memory. When Hutte, 

the boss of the detective agency he works for, 

retires,  he searches for clues in an attempt to discover his own identity. 

This quest leads him to uncover many characters 

who could have been part of his former life 

and could possibly identify him.

Then 

 Emmanuelle Ertel

and her students,

 from her translation workshop in NYU

Stephanie Queiroz

Tamar McCallan-Finkelman

Chelsea Flanagan

and

Jeremy Lakin

read their translation of

Pour que tu ne te perdes pas dans le quartier.

"So you don't get lost"

while Emmanuelle read the French text.

Missing Person as a title could suit any of Modiano’s books

and in this latest novel there is a search as well.

The novel tells the story of an old writer - Jean Daragane - 

who is going to look for his own past 

because of an old address book 

someone returns to him. 

Some mysteries are never solved.

See below a link to a radio show 

where excerpts of Modiano's books are read 

by Guillaume Galllienne and Catherine Deneuve.

http://www.franceinter.fr/player/reecouter?play=1048019

Our next French night 

will take place 

in the Spring.

We'll be pleased to see you 

on Wednesday April 22

at 6 pm

for

a theater play.