Hélène Gestern: “The Book on the Square has become the book on “my” square”

Reviews, interviews, selection... "Libé" guides you through the aisles of the 47th edition of the Nancy Book Fair, a major literary event, which takes place from September 12 to 14.

“When I moved to Nancy and visited its book fair for the first time (then located on Place Stanislas), it was as if, for a weekend, I were living in a fairy tale palace. Books everywhere, and authors in the flesh, whereas, until then, they had been inaccessible figures. I was a student, crazy about reading, fairly penniless, and my best friend and I were dizzy at the abundance. Over the years, I dared to come and greet some authors I admired: precious moments, which I have not forgotten.

“In 2005, a change of scenery: Place Stanislas entered a period of major renovations, and the salon moved to the neighboring square, the one where I had lived for… far too long – but when you love, you don’t leave. The book is now in my square, at the bottom of my stairs. Every year, on my way to work on the assembly of the marquee, which lasts almost ten days, I witness the ballet of the workers, the trucks, the tango of the screwdrivers. The place is monitored by security guards at night: in the early morning, I go to get my croissant under the suspicious eye of the security guards who are finishing their rounds.

“In 2011, I published my first novel. Here I am, propelled to the other side, behind the table, and panic ensues. A parade of colleagues, neighbors, friends, who don’t know I’ve published a book – since I haven’t said so. “But what are you doing here?” Moments of great solitude, when the readers of a famous novelist borrow my pen to sign their check (for his books, not mine); the radiant kindness of my one-day neighbor, Robert Solé: “If you keep writing, one day you’ll have several books on the table, and you’ll see, then it will be much easier.” But right now, I’d like to be a mouse and hide in a hole in the floorboards. Or more selfishly: cross the street and go home.

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"The 'book on my place,' then. There are the years with (I'm a salon attendee), the years without (I'm not). In both cases, the same protocol: the supplies on Thursday evening, because the neighborhood will be sealed off, ransacked for three days. Slip my "Resident" badge into my pocket, get annoyed because the security guards will still search me. If I'm not a participant, go say hello to friends, treat myself to the luxury of attending a few debates, serve as a rear base for exhausted writers or editors who sometimes come to take a break at home, for a coffee, a lunch, a quiet drink, between Mimi the cat and the squirrels in the park.

"If I'm there, take a deep breath, observe the ballet of authors, publishers, journalists, readers, sometimes with the impression of evolving in a film in which I am one of the extras. The book on my square, it's a bewildering crowd, a debauchery of volumes, an orgy of purchases worthy of the most beautiful pages of Zola. And the continuous bass of the rumor of the crowd, a drone that rises from the square, spreads and resonates to the back of my building.

"On Monday morning, the city is deserted, almost groggy (we are too!): it has seen 130,000 people pass through, a quarter more than its entire ordinary population. The workers have already arrived, the symphony of screw drivers is starting up. In less than forty-eight hours, the placid arena, built for horse racing, regains its hieratic, bourgeois splendor. When I was young, I would go for walks in this square to admire its beauty; the living room, I was a dazzled spectator. Today, its walls shelter me and the fairies come to drink coffee at home. Let's hope it lasts."