Jérôme Lindon

“Beautifully presented with Echenoz’s own handwritten notes lining the inside of the covers and running across the centre spread, this touching little memorial work is an honest and unvarnished portrait … It strikes just the right note and is guaranteed to make you smile, maybe even laugh out loud.” —Joseph Schreiber, Rough Ghosts “[Jérôme Lindon is] a tribute to Echenoz’s publisher written shortly after his death in 2001 … there are tussles over titles, and at one point Lindon tells him to withdraw from a new series for a different publisher, though when he does Lindon ‘stares’ in ‘astonishment’ … this book is above all a character sketch. Yet, despite its brevity, when, in the final few pages, Lindon becomes ill, the reader too can feel a loss.” —Grant Rintoul, 1st Reading

“I read Jérôme Lindon as an exercise in narrative persuasion. What does it matter to me who this Jérôme Lindon fellow was? … Echenoz traces the evolution of a relationship, and the ways in which the two men showed their appreciation of and respect for one another. And since this is a word of thanks for the gift of a friendship, Echenoz humbles himself before the memories and lessons given him through it. How could it not matter who Jérôme Lindon was?” —Tom Bowden, The Book Beat

“Jérôme Lindon’s compact pages, translated by Mark Polizzotti with an attention to language which does great justice to its subject matter, can be read in a morning’s commute. It is perhaps best read this way, in the margins of a workday, as an unusually affirming account of the value of a life’s work.” —Leonor Grave, Albertine Staff Pick

“A tiny and unusual book to adore … [Jérôme Lindon’s] brief diarylike entries begin in 1979 and end in 2001, at Lindon’s death. Through them we understand how a fruitful relationship might form and progress between author and a publisher—the author a self-confessed neurotic and the publisher an idiosyncratic and sharp-tongued Man of Distinguished Taste … A portrait of an industry, a portrait of a friend.” —Molly Young

“Echenoz loosely chronicles the publisher-writer relationship, with its ups and downs, closeness and distance … a nice little personal tribute.” —Michael Orthofer, The Complete Review

“This funny and quietly tender reflection from novelist Echenoz recounts his friendship with his editor Jérôme Lindon, who headed the French publishing house Les Éditions de Minuit from 1948 until his death in 2001 and published the work of Samuel Beckett, Marguerite Duras, and Alain Robbe-Grillet, among others … Echenoz offers glimpses of the humanity beneath Lindon’s gruff exterior, revealing him to be a passionate, reliable editor. The result is a charming portrayal of the often complicated writer-editor relationship.” —Publishers Weekly

”[Jérôme Lindon is] well, maybe not sprightly, because sometimes peeved or frustrated, but moving, heartfelt, immediate.” —Lydia Davis

“I laughed out loud reading Echenoz’s charming and lively tribute to Jérôme Lindon, even as it made me nostalgic for the lost literary life I dreamt of being part of when I was young. A beautiful book that celebrates an utterly singular character.” —Nicole Krauss

“Reading this remembrance is like tagging along for a dream that celebrates the vulnerability, love, and complicated relationships from which all great art springs.” —DW Gibson

Jean Echenoz was born in 1947 in Vaucluse, France. He is the author of more than a dozen novels, including Cherokee, Double Jeopardy, Chopin’s Move, Big Blondes, Piano, Ravel, Running, Lightning, and Special Envoy. His work has received a great number of literary prizes, among them the Prix Goncourt, the Prix Medicis, and the European Literature Jeopardy Prize. He lives in Paris.

Translator Bio:

Mark Polizzotti has translated more than sixty books from the French, including Arthur Rimbaud’s The Drunken Boat: Selected Writings and Jean Echenoz’s Command Performance, and is the author of thirteen books, including Revolution of the Mind: The Life of Andre Breton, Sympathy for the Traitor: A Translation Manifesto, Why Surrealism Matters, and Jump Cuts: Essays. He has translated Scholastique Mukasonga’s Kibogo and his translation of Mukasonga’s Murmurs from the Hills is forthcoming. He lives in New York.

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