The Aux Quatre Coins du Mot festival offers four visits as last chances to discover the Kickshaws editions and their philosophy on the borders of Oulipo. A journey told by Gilles Bouley-Franchitti.
With its colorful facade where anagrams pirouette and its printing press in the window, it’s hard to miss La Maison des Mots, at 14, Grande-Rue in La Charité. It is the most iconoclastic facade of the historic center.
# four-corners-of-the-word-2024
However, few people have opened the door of the bookstore, a publishing house and a place halfway between bibliophilia and bibliomania, opened in 2010 by the author, publisher, printer, typographer, poet and book designer John Crombie and his wife, illustrator Sheila Bourne.
While the place is experiencing its last moments, another adopted Charity man of letters, Gilles Bouley-Franchitti, is offering four visits during the festival. With the verve that characterizes him, he tells the story of this “somewhat special place” with life.
Doors half open before they close definitively
If it had a life before, The House of Words is like the books printed by the Crombie-Bourne and their publishing house Kickshaws. Atypical. In the midst of the combinatory books that made the Kickshaws mark, it is this modest creative energy that Gilles Bouley-Franchitti manages to illustrate, supported by the important memoirs left by John Crombie.This printing press has seen it… (Photo Le Régional de Cosne and Charitois editor)
Through the journey of this author and this illustrator who became publishers and printers tired of the deadlines imposed on them, we come across Alphonse Allais, Raymond Queneau, Samuel Beckett and the little-known comedian Cami. These visits are also an opportunity to admire “the relics” that are the last copies of the books published by Kickshaws, as there are so few left.
Practical The Kickshaws Museum. Visit (1:30 hours) guided by Gilles Bouley-Franchitti, Thursday May 9, Friday May 10 and Saturday May 11, at 4:30 p.m., and Sunday May 12, at 2:30 p.m. Price: €6. Reservations recommended at 03.86.70.15.06 (18 people per visit).
Receive our leisure newsletter by email and find ideas for outings and activities in your region.
Felix Paulet
discover Kickshaws and its “brain-made” books at La Charité-sur-Loire){kind=link}