Prix ​​Goncourt: Virginie Despentes dismissed from the outset


Former juror, the writer will not be able to compete with her latest novel Dear assholethe biggest success of the literary season.

First choices, first disappointed: the novel by Virginie Despentes,Dear asshole“, biggest success of the literary season, will not win the Goncourt prize, dismissed from the outset because she is a former juror.

The author of “Vernon Subutex“, back to the novel after five years, received almost unanimous criticism to praise this epistolary exchange about addiction and the #MeToo movement. But he was out of the race.

It was not mentioned because, for us, it is obvious: Virginie Despentes cannot compete“, explained Didier Decoin, president of the Goncourt academy since January 2020. “Ethically, it was inadmissible. And that doesn’t mean at all that we didn’t like Virginie’s book, on the contrary…“.

Virginie Despentes is the star of this literary season, driven by very favorable reviews, and sales which reached some 65,000 copies, according to figures put forward by her publisher at the end of August. Winner of the Renaudot Prize in 2010, for “apocalypse baby», Virginie Despentes was herself a juror of Goncourt for four years. She quit in January 2020 to focus on writing.

The deliberations remain very opaque, but Pierre Assouline, critic, journalist and author, has already indicated on his website that he loved two titles from the first selection. They appear at this point among the favorites: “The Clandestine Life» by Monica Sabolo, which mixes personal history and investigation of the extreme left group Direct Action, and «The heart does not give inby Grégoire Bouillier, a 900-page return to a terrible news item from the 1990s, the voluntary agony of a solitary old lady.

happy surprise

Other titles are perceived as serious contenders by their quality of writing: “Taormina» by Yves Ravey, a noir novel set in Sicily, «live fast» by Brigitte Giraud, the story of the last days of a husband who killed himself on a motorbike, or «Almost sistersby Cloé Korman, an investigation into the Holocaust. Muriel Barbery, who seemed very far from the tastes of Goncourt with her first success in 2007 (“The elegance of the Hedgehog“), is 15 years later in the race with “An hour of fervor“.

Goncourt’s first list is always a happy surprise for a few low-key novels so far. This is the case this year forBeirut-sur-Seine» by Franco-Lebanese Sabyl Ghoussoub, «A human sumby the Haitian Makenzy Orcel, orOur dear old lady authorby Anne Serre. A fiction about an adviser to the Russian presidency was included despite appearing in April: “The Mage of the Kremlin» by Giuliano da Empoli, recommended among the summer readings of the Renaudot Prize. The winner must be designated on November 3.

Inclination for thelarge»

The selection proved Goncourt’s penchant for “large» publishing houses, with three authors from Gallimard, two from Flammarion or Stock, one from Seuil, Albin Michel, Actes Sud and even Minuit. Houses “medium» have a smaller place: Rivages, L’Iconoclaste and Sabine Wespieser. The editor of “Dear asshole», Grasset, does not place any title in this first selection, but will be able to make up for it with other autumn prizes. Renaudot follows on Wednesday, disclosing its first selection.

The Inrocks literary prize published on Tuesday a first selection of twenty “French novels or stories“Where is that of Virginie Despentes. There are other titles not retained by the Goncourt, although noticed by the critics, such as “The Thirteenth Hour» by Emmanuelle Bayamack-Tam, «Towards violenceby Blandine Rinkel, orThe Exportedby Sonia Devillers. The Goncourt high school students, awarded on November 24, will work on the same titles as his eldest. 55 establishments are associated, from Lens to Martinique via New York and Cavaillon.



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