Feminine, the entries in our test list are certainly feminine. Women in mourning, women in combat, women in fashion, “comforting” women… This is the case of Anne-Dauphine Julliand, 7th in the ranking with Adding life to the days (The Arenas). Fate befalls this woman and her husband, parents of four children, three of whom are now deceased. In 2011, she recounted the illness of her daughter Thaïs, who died at the age of 3 from an incurable genetic disease, in the poignant Two small steps on the wet sandthen his second daughter died, suffering from the same illness, finally, his eldest son, Gaspard, committed suicide on the night of January 20 to 21, 2022, on the eve of his twentieth birthday. How to live?
Anne-Dauphine Julliand recounts the gestures, words and connections that are so many lights in the night. Clémentine Vergnaud is no longer there to tell about her fight against the “crab” but the journalist from franceinfo described his struggle in a podcast (My life facing cancer) before passing away in December 2023, on Christmas Eve, at the age of 31. A painful story that we can read today in Clementine’s Diary (Seuil/France Info), 19th in the list.
The journalist and author Laure Adler also experienced tragedies (reported in See you tonight Gallimard, 2003) and has always fought to move forward. With The Voice of Women (Grasset), 15th in the list, the famous biographer and radio and television producer wanders, from her meetings with women of all social classes to her conversations with young girls, from her investigations in the associative environment to her edifying readings. So many lived moments that she brings together in a manifesto that she wants to be resolutely feminist.
The L’Express prize list.
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Left-wing anti-Semitism
Has she read the latest book by Marie Robert, philosophy professor, Instagrammer and creator of Philosophy is sexy (philosophical reflections on a daily basis, via Instagram, podcasts, etc.)? If yes, The Miracle of Comfort (Flammarion/Versilio), 16th in the list, will perhaps have allowed him to rekindle his joys “by observing what around us is still worth it”. At least this is what Marie Robert hopes to instill with her book, divided into nine chapters which “have no other desire than to remind us of everything that can give meaning to our lives.” Eva Illouz, she publishes October 8. Genealogy of a virtuous hatred (Gallimard, 8th in the ranking). In this Leaflet, the Franco-Israeli sociologist and academic questions the revelation of left-wing anti-Semitism in the aftermath of the Hamas attack on Israel.
To talk about women, you also had to have a man. Journalist specializing in fashion, Loïc Prigent does not only address the female gender of course, the fact remains that A thousand billion ribbons. The real history of fashion (Grasset), 14th in the ranking, should seriously interest him. He reveals French and international couture, from the 19th century to the opening of Gabrielle Chanel’s first boutique in 1913. The great couturier Worth, Singer sewing machines, Empress Eugénie, chief buyer, the first department stores , the birth of collections, fashion shows and models as well as labels… flow from the pen of this great connoisseur of the backstage of fashion week.
A word, finally, on the 7th arrival of the week, who works in a very different register. At 79 years old, the agricultural engineer by training and specialist in health economics Jean de Kervasdoué never stops railing against environmentalists. Afterwards, among other things, The Preachers of the Apocalypse. To put an end to ecological and health delusions (Plon, 2007) and The ecologists lie to us (Albin Michel, 2021), here is The Great Mystification. Ecology: an imposture that does not speak its name (Albin Michel), 17th in the list. A polemical book against, says the author, certain ecologists who virtuosoly handle bad faith…