This announcement is an answer to the revelation, in September, links between François Noudelmann, selected in the first selection, and its companion Camille Laurens, a member of the Academy. His book has, as well, been dismissed, Tuesday, of the second selection.
Le Monde with AFP
The Goncourt Academy announced, Tuesday, October 5, having adopted a new rule rendering ineligible at its price “The works of spouses, companions or close relatives of the members of the jury”. Adopted unanimously, this requirement forces the jurors to reveal their potential local links under penalty of exclusion.
This ad is an answer to Revelation in September, links between François Noudelmann, selected in the first selection, and his companion Camille Laurens, member of the Academy and Jurrée Goncourt. The Academy had argued that they lived one in Paris, the other in New York, without being married, and that all the jurors had been informed before voting on the book in question. Cadillac children, however, was dismissed from the second selection of the Goncourt Prize, the rule taking effect immediately.
Another rule was also unanimously adopted on Tuesday: “The members of the jury holding a literary heading in a media refrain from chronicling the works in selection as long as these works are there.” Again, Camille Laurens had been at the heart of the controversy after signing a severe criticism in September, in another book of the first selection, the Anne Berest postal card. For the Academy, the goal is to “respect the secret of the vote”.
As his President Didier Decoin and his secretary Philippe Claudel said, the jury of the most prestigious French literary prize acted quickly to appease the criticism of the opacity of his procedures and conflicts of interest.
The goncourt awarded November 3rd
The second selection, unveiled on Tuesday with nine titles, shows two eliminations that contrast with the enthusiasm of literary criticism and readers, that of the fire of Maria Pitchet and in the spring of the monsters of Philippe Jaenada. Unusual at this point, it does not already have any book from Gallimard editions, which had carried it in 2020 with the anomaly of Hervé Le Tellier.
Compete, in the second selection, the journey in the East (Flammarion) of Christine Angot, the Postcard (Grasset) of Anne Berest, Child of Somaud (Grasset) of Sorj Chalandon, Milwaukee Blues (Sabine Wespieser) of Louis-Philippe Dalembert, the Lord Fiancé (the olive tree) of Agnes Desarthe, adapt (stock) of Clara Dupont-Monod, the light of Etampes (the observatory) of Abel Quentin, the most secret Memory of Men (Philippe Rey) of Mohamed Mbougar Sarr and the girl named (midnight) of Tanguy Viel.
This second selection must be tightened one last time, on October 26, before the price is awarded on November 3rd. The goncourt can only win a check of ten euros, but ensures its winner an exceptional advertising and a certain place in posterity.