It’s official: there will no longer be a Book Festival in Bron. And yet, since 1987, the event has established itself as a pioneer in the genre, “where there were only book fairs focused exclusively on signings», recall the event teams.
This festival offered to give a voice to writers, and offered a real artistic program, “ themed and demanding “. To do this, the teams willingly relied on the expertise of independent booksellers to “think about crossovers between literature and other forms of artistic expression, author dialogues and musical readings, cinematographic projections…», They add.
Over the decades, thanks to the leadership of its founders, Véronique Forcet and Colette Gruas, and under the successive artistic direction of Brigitte Giraud, Laetitia Voreppe and Yann Nicol, the festival, supported by a team “fideal and committed», rose among the major literary events on the national scene, and covered general literature as well as the human sciences and even children’s literature.
40,000 visitors to the 2024 edition
«It’s an announcement that may seem brutal, but it follows a long reflection”concludes Yann Nicol, current director of the festival, contacted by ActuaLitté. The literary critic points the finger“a difficult context, in all respects, in the cultural sector“. Underneath this formulation lies a precarious financial situation, combined with “inflation and rising costs“. Result: the extraordinary general meeting voted to dissolve the Lire à Bron association, this Monday, October 7, 2024.
However, the event showed good results: 40,000 visitors attended the previous edition of the festival in March 2024, the last theme of which ironically was “save love“… Let us also note the dynamism of the association, which guaranteed two literary prizes and created, in 2020, a new project entitled “La Booksellers Route“. The latter organized literary meetings outside the walls in areas devoid of literary events.
“The teams were exhausted”
But continuing to innovate, and developing projects while sustaining the latest launches, has proven to be a risky bet, and an expensive one, what’s more. “We depend a lot on public authorities (City of Bron, Metropolis of Lyon, Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes region, DRAC, National Book Center)», Explains the director.
Even if he emphasizes the investment “loyal partners, who did what they could to avoid reaching this point», It was in September, while planning the 2025 edition, that Yann Nicol and his team faced a mixed feeling. “We have reached the end of the road», he notes.
He details: “The situation weighed on the teams, who were exhausted“. At the mention of the departure of Aurélie Dubois, communications manager, four days earlier, the literature enthusiast remained in the background. “The life of associations and festivals goes through different states», he concludes.
Afraid of “editing too much?” »
« We are lucid and prefer to end things in the best possible way», slips Yann Nicol. The end clap seems to mark the end of an era for the Lyonnais, and many players in the book world. “It was the Bron Book Festival that gave me the desire and the audacity to create the Villeurbanne Youth Book Festival», saddens Gérard Picot in the association’s Facebook publication.
« We are aware of the impact and attachment of the public and actors to this festival. It saddens us, but we accept it and we try to do it in an elegant way“, reassures the festival director, before concluding: “the Book Festival was also the symbol of an era marked by freedom, demands for all, cultural democratization, carrying high the idea that art and literature allow everyone to find a place in the world .»
Image credits : Romainbehar, CC0, Wikimedia Commons
