In 1996, an unknown french woman aged 27 became a sudden celebrity of the french intellectual milieu with the release of her first published novel called "Pig tales" (Truismes in french). The man behind this discovery was a discreet publisher named Paul Otchakovsky-Laurens, the founder of POL Editions - a small french publishing house specialized in quality modern literature with demanding authors in their catalogs including several big names such as Martin Winckler, Emmanuel Carrere, Darrieussecq of course and the laureate of the Prix Goncourt 2008, Atiq Rahimi.
Thirteen years later, both Darrieussecq and Monsieur Paul are in Melbourne for the release of "Tom is dead" a novel published in 2007 and recently translated in english by an australian up and coming writer, Lia Hills. Darrieussecq participated in a number of literary events including a Q&A about her writing and particularly about this new book set in Australia; a detail never seen before.
In 2007, "Tom est mort" was the subject of a breathtaking accusation of "psychological plagiarism" launched by Camille Laurens, an author also published by the same small company, POL. She attacked Darrieussecq claiming echoes of her own work being obvious specially from an autobiographical book "Philippe" being about the death of her own son. The scandal was unjustified and unfounded and Monsieur Paul remained supportive to Darrieussecq taking Lauren's accusation almost as a personal assault.
Monsieur Paul began in the publishing trade as a reader. In late seventies, he discovered Georges Perec with "La vie mode d'emploi". He founded his own publishing house in 1983 and gained Marguerite Duras fidelity with two of her books published in the mid-eighties by POL. The publishing world considers Monsieur Paul as an innovator. He reads all received manuscripts and makes his own decisions on what to publish. Once he adopts a writer, it is for life. Darrieussecq is a great example of this fidelity and in thirteen years, thirteen books were written and published by this dynamic duo.
Darrieussecq and Monsieur Paul are approachable and very friendly. We had long chat about various subjects including my origins, the Armenian people. Otchakovsky shared his admiration on Pelechian while Darrieussecq is an unconditional follower of Atom Egoyan's movies.
POL Editions is located in one of my favorite street in Paris, at 33 Rue Saint-Andre-des-arts in the heart of the intellectual milieu of the French Capital.
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