Un désir démesuré d’amitié is an invitation to an open conversation about the ever-widening gap between the variety and profound hybridity of the ties that bind us to those closest to us, and the inability of our judiciary to recognize the value and the power of these ties.

The child of 3 parents, all three heterosexual, Hélène, who describes herself as very close to her family, has found in the history of the LBGTQ+ communities another genealogy, not to replace the first, but to complete it. This history, full of silences, euphemisms, violence and discrimination, but also of joy, forms one of the thread of her narrative, through letters, stories, photos and documentaries found in various LGBTQ+ archives. Her approach as a writer and as a historian of photography turns this exploration into a fascinating journey.

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From 1908 to 1931, Gertrude Stein regularly composed portraits of her contemporaries in a variety of forms. This collection offers a selection, as a complement to her great work, The Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas. From Jean-Pollinaire to Picasso, via Satie, Hemingway, Fitzgerald, Alice Toklas, Woodrow Wilson and even her dogs Polybe and Basket, these texts, which are as varied as they are evocative, provide an in-depth self-portrait of the great American writer, while evoking questions of art and literature, and restoring the ambiance of the Belle Époque.

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Rebellious Lives traces the lives of black women who left the American South in search of a better life for the cities of the Northeast, New York and Philadelphia, between 1890 and 1930, after the abolition of slavery.

Drawing on police sources, the writings of philanthropists and social reformers, court records and the notes taken by the young W.E.B. Du Bois during his investigations, Saidiya Hartman brings them to life, restoring these girls and women to their status as subjects, drawing vibrant portraits of unruly black women, reconstructing their desires, their efforts to find joie de vivre, their aspirations for freedom, their zest for life, their thoughts, their tested but free bodies, their anarchism.

The result is unforgettable stories, carried by exceptional writing, that transform our representations of the “deviant” subaltern classes and the black condition in post-slavery societies. This attention to the infra-political also opens up other genealogies of black radicalism and the revolution of mores. Seventy rare and moving photographs illustrate the lives of these women on the margins of society.

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Nina Léger is fascinated by places, and investigating their past allows her to search for traces of facts that history may have not retained. The result of her search, however, draped in fiction, offers a new narrative on the origins of the state of California, one that questions and dent into the happy myth of the Golden State. 

In 1848, gold was discovered in the Feather River in Northern California. A town called Oroville was born, and the gold rush began, allowing the city to grow, and it survived thanks to the river.

It’s the feather river that first draws Thea, a young scientist fresh out of the University of San Francisco to Oroville. She was hired to verify the proper functioning of salmon incubators, a type of device supposed to ensure the survival of the travelling species that once freely spawned in North American rivers. In 2020, as mega-fires are threatening Oroville city, Thea must flee.  As a world teeters on the brink, the violence of her own history resurfaces through.

Carried by Nina Leger’s powerful yet tender language, the ancient song of the river mingles with the voices of a shattered present to tell the epic story of a civilization that built itself by destroying, to the point of preparing its own ruin.

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Here’s an invitation, generous, elegant, erudite yet always accessible, to follow him in this exploration of a passion that has spanned the entire career of its author, Bruno Corty, publisher of Le Figaro Littéraire.

Readers of his literary supplement will find here intact the eclecticism, curiosity, acuity and finesse of Corty’s reviews. But what makes this book so addictive is the freedom with which he approaches and presents the authors he holds dear. There’s nothing academic about this dictionary: while the entries follow one another, they’re in no way alike, and we find ourselves greedily turning the pages, curious as to what’s to come. Read more.

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