The Forum
AIR #3d edition
The International Forum on the Novel : and event conceived and organised by Le Monde and the Villa Gillet
« How does the novel speak about the world? In what way can literature not just reflect reality but also transform it? Answering these questions has been the aim of the International Forum on the Novel, which has been organised every year since 2007 by Le Monde and the Villa Gillet. The project was born of a very simple observation: that the novel is not dead or even dying but that it is alive, vivacious and indispensable from both an aesthetic and a political point of view.
Literature does not just content itself with describing the world; it also illuminates it and attempts to make sense of its enigmas. It reveals its paradoxes, its unexpected depths, its contradictions and its pains more clearly than most works of non-fiction can. It is both a tool for understanding the world as well as the source of dreams. As such, it is a site of freedom.
From the beginning, the Forum has followed a fundamental principle: that it should not be just another book fair, to which authors come to present their own work, but rather a series of exchanges based on pre-determined subjects and papers prepared in advance. In other words, it is intended to be a discussion about literature as a genre rather than simply a discussion about specific texts. Supported by the Rhône-Alpes region, the City of Lyon and the State, co-produced with the ‘Subsistances’ and supported by precious partnerships (notably with ‘France Inter’ and ‘Christian Bourgois’ who publish the papers from the Forum in the ‘Lexique Nomade / Nomadic Lexicon’) the event has managed to fulfill its demanding aims. It has so far entailed late-night debates, conferences with foreign novelists of today about French writers of the past, interviews with well-known personalities from outside the field of literature and readings accompanied by music.
With always the same will to reach excellence and this crazy, delicious desire : the desire to see spirit and ideas passing round. »
Raphaëlle Rérolle - Assistant Director of the Monde des Livres
Guy Walter - Directeur de la Villa Gillet et des Subsistances
The Novel : Beyond borders
« Literature moves the boundaries. Sitting at the crossroads between the internal and the external, the private and the public, between different genres, cultures, languages and systems, it is a place of transition par excellence. For this art, there are no boundaries. It mixes different elements together, provoking scandal and wonderment. Thanks to literature, the past feeds the present, reviving the memories of whole peoples, just as of generations or of individuals. The violence of acts or of feelings can be conveyed in words. Fantasy, dreams and the fantastic can overlap with reality. »
Raphaëlle Rérolle, Le Monde
Le Monde
In 2009, Le Monde des Livres will continue its adventure with the International Forum on the Novel, as part of its aim to bring novelists and readers together throughout the year. For over forty years, the weekly supplement of Le Monde has attempted to do all that it can to embrace editorial diversity, just as much with regard to French and foreign literature as to essays and other publications. It is entirely independent, aiming to provide the man in the street with reliable information. It aims to both entertain and inform.
