“A saving read in the anxiety-provoking period we are going through”

“Reading is part of my life. Vacations and weekends are largely devoted to it. I really like giving books when I go to dinner at people's houses: I find it more fun than a bottle of wine or flowers. It’s an opportunity to discover universes, to reveal yourself a little through a literary choice. At one time, I organized evenings where everyone brought their favorite work of the year to share. In addition to the fact that he received the Goncourt des Lycéens in 2010, Tell them about battles, kings and elephants by Mathias Enard is, in my opinion, a saving read in the anxiety-provoking period we are going through. It was first of all this title, delicious and in Alexandrian, which attracted me. A promise of travel, a moment of poetry, an invitation to let your imagination wander which is confirmed throughout the pages.

It is a tale at the crossroads of reality and imagination, an adventure novel in the 16th century where the cultures of the Renaissance and the Ottoman Empire intertwine: Michelangelo is invited to a very European Constantinople and very tolerant to build a bridge over the Golden Horn. Through this story on the Bosphorus, Mathias Enard talks about the artist at work, his difficulties, his dreams, his inspirations… The bridge in question here was never built but without this journey in Orient, which would have taken place, Michelangelo would undoubtedly not have designed the Laurentian Medicean Library or the Sistine Chapel as we know them. From a more personal point of view, my father was born in Istanbul, I went there with him, and even if it is the Constantinople dreamed of in 1506 in the book, the scent of the Orient that comes from it exudes is part of my DNA.” M.L