The review of magazines. While waiting to know who will be awarded the 2024 Goncourt Prize on November 4, a very French distinction which contributes to the book economy, the review Esprit decided to shine a spotlight on the publishing sector.
Constantly buried but always reborn, the book actually shows a formidable capacity to adapt to technological changes. About it, the economist Françoise Benhamou speaks of “paradoxical life”which reflects both the “tremendous vitality » of the sector, but also its ability to “ be part of the long time that goes from writing to meeting the reader, while adapting to a society prone to acceleration”.
A great publisher of human sciences, who died a year ago, François Gèze (1948-2023) is present in this issue thanks to a posthumous text, in which he explains that “the continuity of the fundamentals of our businesses has remained very robust”. We think we hear him when he fears that he will be reproached for his « optimism ».
A work of the mind and a commercial object
But the Covid-19 crisis has proven the great resilience of books, where anxious reading and the pleasure of reading have intertwined. In this sector where craftsmanship (the small publisher) has always rubbed shoulders with industry (groups such as Hachette or Editis), the book remains marked by its dual nature: a work of the mind of an author, like the wrote Immanuel Kant, which is also a commercial object, marketed by a bookseller.
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In France, where there are more bookstores than in the United States, the law on the single price of books, adopted in August 1981 by the left, then validated by the right returning to power in 1986, reflects the importance of public policies in France, as explained by information sciences professor Bertrand Legendre. This law has had a significant impact internationally. In France, it has imposed itself on online booksellers, like Amazon, with the battle over shipping costs, and it has been adapted to digital books.
If there is one area where the Internet and social networks have shaken up books, for better or for worse, it is that of literary criticism. On the one hand, the emergence of communities of readers, such as Goodreads or Babelio, allowed exchange and sharing, notes communications teacher Louis Wiart, on the other, there was the appearance of influencers literary, media and especially commercial figures.
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Finally, has the city of Marseille become the new temple of publishing? Rémi Baille and Anne Dujin, from the magazine Esprit, embarked on an open dialogue with the publishers Adrien Servières and Marie-Pierre Gracedieu, who run Le Bruit du Monde, Baptiste Lanaspeze, from Wildproject editions, as well as with Roland Alberto, who runs the bookstore L’Odeur du temps . Their common point: they all live in the Phocaean city and demonstrate the energy of the Calanques.
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