Éditions Denoël is a

French French (french: français(e), link=no) may refer to: * Something of, from, or related to France ** French language, which originated in France, and its various dialects and accents ** French people, a nation and ethnic group identified with Franc ...

publishing house Publishing is the activity of making information, literature, music, software and other content available to the public for sale or for free. Traditionally, the term refers to the creation and distribution of printed works, such as books, newsp ...

founded in 1930. Acquired by

Éditions Gallimard Éditions Gallimard (), formerly Éditions de la Nouvelle Revue Française (1911–1919) and Librairie Gallimard (1919–1961), is one of the leading French book publishers. In 2003 it and its subsidiaries published 1,418 titles. Founded by G ...

in 1951, it publishes collections spanning fiction,

non-fiction Nonfiction, or non-fiction, is any document or media content that attempts, in good faith, to provide information (and sometimes opinions) grounded only in facts and real life, rather than in imagination. Nonfiction is often associated with b ...

and

comic books A comic book, also called comicbook, comic magazine or (in the United Kingdom and Ireland) simply comic, is a publication that consists of comics art in the form of sequential juxtaposed panels that represent individual scenes. Panels are of ...

. It published some of the most important French authors of the interwar period, including

Louis-Ferdinand Céline Louis Ferdinand Auguste Destouches (27 May 1894 – 1 July 1961), better known by the pen name Louis-Ferdinand Céline ( , ) was a French novelist, polemicist and physician. His first novel '' Journey to the End of the Night'' (1932) won the '' P ...

Louis Aragon Louis Aragon (, , 3 October 1897 – 24 December 1982) was a French poet who was one of the leading voices of the surrealist movement in France. He co-founded with André Breton and Philippe Soupault the surrealist review '' Littérature''. He w ...

and

Antonin Artaud Antoine Marie Joseph Paul Artaud, better known as Antonin Artaud (; 4 September 1896 – 4 March 1948), was a French writer, poet, dramatist, visual artist, essayist, actor and theatre director. He is widely recognized as a major figure of the E ...

History

1930 Events January * January 15 – The Moon moves into its nearest point to Earth, called perigee, at the same time as its fullest phase of the Lunar Cycle. This is the closest moon distance at in recent history, and the next one will be ...

the Belgian Robert Denoël and the American Bernard Steele (1902–1979), founded Éditions Denoël-Steele, later shortened to Éditions Denoël.^:228 It had its first success in 1932 with Céline's '' Voyage au bout de la nuit''. Other early success include Louis Aragon's ''Les Cloches de Bâle'' (1934), Antonin Artaud's ''Héliogabale ou l'anarchiste couronné'' (1934) and Céline's ''Mort à crédit'' (

1936 Events January–February * January 20 – George V of the United Kingdom and the British Dominions and Emperor of India, dies at his Sandringham Estate. The Prince of Wales succeeds to the throne of the United Kingdom as King E ...

). Denoël can be considered unusual in respect to its diverse choice of publications. Until May 1940, for example, it published an Anti-German political magazine as well as the

anti-Semitic Antisemitism (also spelled anti-semitism or anti-Semitism) is hostility to, prejudice towards, or discrimination against Jews. A person who holds such positions is called an antisemite. Antisemitism is considered to be a form of racism. Antis ...

pamphlet A pamphlet is an unbound book (that is, without a hard cover or binding). Pamphlets may consist of a single sheet of paper that is printed on both sides and folded in half, in thirds, or in fourths, called a ''leaflet'' or it may consist of a f ...

s of Céline and

Lucien Rebatet Lucien Rebatet (15 November 1903 – 24 August 1972) was a French writer, journalist, and intellectual. He is known as an exponent of fascism and virulent antisemite but also as the author of '' Les Deux étendards'', regarded by some as one of ...

. Bernard Steele left the company because of Céline's pamphlet ''Mea culpa'' (1936). Robert Denoël was "openly supportive of Nazi Germany" and the company was known for its

collaborationism Wartime collaboration is cooperation with the enemy against one's country of citizenship in wartime, and in the words of historian Gerhard Hirschfeld, "is as old as war and the occupation of foreign territory". The term ''collaborator'' dates to ...

during the German occupation of Paris. The company received capital from the Germans and published pro-Nazi books, including "anti-Semitic manuals

. . . The ellipsis (, also known informally as dot dot dot) is a series of dots that indicates an intentional omission of a word, sentence, or whole section from a text without altering its original meaning. The plural is ellipses. The term origin ...

a collection of Hitler's speeches, and the two most famous anti-Semitic literary works of the time: a new edition of Céline's ''Bagatelles pour un massacre'' (1937) and Lucien Rebatet's ''Les Déscombres".''^:161 During those same years, however, they also advertised "well-known authors of the left" and published the works of the Jewish author

Elsa Triolet Elsa Triolet (born Ella Yuryevna Kagan; (russian: Элла Юрьевна Каган); – 16 June 1970) was a Russian-French writer and translator. Biography Ella Yuryevna Kagan was born into a Jewish family of Yuri Alexandrovich Kagan, a ...

.^:161 Denoël was murdered on 2 December 1945 while changing a wheel on his car.^:xi The circumstances surrounding his death were mysterious, and it was "possible that he was assassinated for political reasons"; the police officially listed it as a "random crime of violence".^:xi Following his death, Denoël's mistress, Jeanne Loviton, became the legal owner of the company.^:37 In 1951 she sold a 90 percent stake of the company to Gaston Gallimard, "Denoël's arch enemy and publishing rival".^:301 Nowadays, Éditions Denoël publishes around one hundred titles per year. Among the most famous authors published by Éditions Denoël are

Sébastien Japrisot Sébastien Japrisot (4 July 1931 – 4 March 2003) was a French author, screenwriter and film director. His pseudonym was an anagram of Jean-Baptiste Rossi, his real name. Renowned for subverting the rules of the crime genre, Japrisot broke down ...

Jack Kerouac Jean-Louis Lebris de Kérouac (; March 12, 1922 – October 21, 1969), known as Jack Kerouac, was an American novelist and poet who, alongside William S. Burroughs and Allen Ginsberg, was a pioneer of the Beat Generation. Of French-Canadian anc ...

Norman Mailer Nachem Malech Mailer (January 31, 1923 – November 10, 2007), known by his pen name Norman Kingsley Mailer, was an American novelist, journalist, essayist, playwright, activist, filmmaker and actor. In a career spanning over six decades, Mailer ...

Ray Bradbury Ray Douglas Bradbury (; August 22, 1920June 5, 2012) was an American author and screenwriter. One of the most celebrated 20th-century American writers, he worked in a variety of modes, including fantasy, science fiction, horror, mystery fictio ...

Philip K. Dick Philip Kindred Dick (December 16, 1928March 2, 1982), often referred to by his initials PKD, was an American science fiction writer. He wrote 44 novels and about 121 short stories, most of which appeared in science fiction magazines during his l ...

Michael Moorcock Michael John Moorcock (born 18 December 1939) is an English people, English writer, best-known for science fiction and fantasy fiction, fantasy, who has published a number of well-received literary novels as well as comic thrillers, graphic nov ...

and Jeanne Benameur. In 2004, Denoël published '' Suite française'', which became a publishing sensation. The novel won the Prix Renaudot for 2004, the first time that the prize has been awarded posthumously. From 2006, then editor Olivier Rubinstein also published the literary

review A review is an evaluation of a publication, product, service, or company or a critical take on current affairs in literature, politics or culture. In addition to a critical evaluation, the review's author may assign the work a content rating, ...

'' Le Meilleur des mondes''.

References

External links

Official site

Site for ''Le Meilleur des Mondes''
{{DEFAULTSORT:Editions Denoel Book publishing companies of France French speculative fiction publishers