Vladimir Nabokov

NABOKV-L post 0010774, Sat, 11 Dec 2004 09:19:26 -0800

Subject
Fwd: Re: Lolita publisherGirodias
Date
Body
In a book published recently (La Traversée du livre, Paris, Viviane Hamy, 2004),
Jean-Jacques Pauvert, the publisher (in French) of De Sade's works in the
fifties and other sexually-explicit books who tussled with French censorship,
deals extensively with Girodias with whom he worked, Girodias often publishing
in English books Pauvert published in French. Pauvert, whom I met at a
symposium on censorship years ago and with whom I talked then about Girodias,
is very critical of his former colleague in this book, insisting on the fact
that Girodias, half-Jewish, collaborated with the Germans during the war,
publishing guide books in German for the occupation forces, something which had
already been mentioned somewhere as early as 1986, apparently. In a leaflet
presenting his "Edition du Chêne", which was recently sent me by the director
of the "Village Voice Book Shop" in Paris, Girodias uses as epigraph a
quotation from Marshal Pétain. Pauvert also mentions that Girodias had become
an alcoholic, not particularly sucessful with women.

All this is of secondary importance to the Nabokovians, no doubt, but I thought
it might help understand Girodias' attitude towards Nabokov after 1955.

Maurice Couturier

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