Books: Dalva, a publishing house just for women

It is not against men. But it is a fact. Today there are fewer women in literature. So Juliette Ponce decided to create a publishing house just for them. Not political, hardly militant. A space, simply to regroup their voices. "Only 37% of the books that appear are written by women," explains the editor who went to Denoël, Buchet Chastel. In the great literary prizes, they are only 27% to be rewarded. They are less daring, do not feel legitimate, there are pre-integrated, hidden mechanisms. Things are progressing, they are being edited more and more, but I thought that concentrating these forces, bringing them together, would allow them to be heard better. "

Here, there is no question of war of the sexes.

“In France, the positions on the relationship between men and women are very clear.

It is a hot topic, for all generations.

We prefer the debate of ideas to action, to pragmatism, deplores the one who has lived the last seven years in London.

There is ultimately little room to say simply:

women are less published, what do we do?

"

So during the confinement, she had this idea, and chose this form of positive discrimination.

"We start from a strong principle, to be in the nuance then", she sums up.

Read alsoDivas, passionarias, artists: 3 exhibitions to celebrate pioneers

This spotlight is also to bring these ladies out of the themes to which they are still too often confined. “We assimilate them to the

romance

style

, where we talk about motherhood, love stories, psychology. With the #MeToo movement, there have been loads of books on rape, or very demanding texts with an injunction to be a powerful woman. But it's still a way of reducing the voice of women to a single thing, while it can be very diverse, on many subjects, ”insists the editor.

It is in particular the book of adventures and immersion in nature, "Nature Writing", that the specialist would like to develop. “In this style, we always imagine a man in the woods hunting bears,” remarks the quadra. I would like to have the views of women on this, they have an experience to tell. The first book published by the house, "The Octopus and I," Meeting between an octopus and a woman in the harsh landscapes of Tasmania, was written by an Australian author, Erin Hortle, passionate about the ocean who grew up by the sea. “She was ill as a teenager, and her relatives brought her books from great explorers so that she could continue to be close to this element so important to her. But it did not fit into the description these men made of it. It,his relationship to the sea, his feelings were different. "

Objective: ten books per year

It is from a novel of this literary movement that the publishing house takes its name.

Dalva, as the heroine of the eponymous novel by Jim Harrison.

“She is free, sensual, connected to nature… Exactly the kind of women whose manuscript I would have published!

Exclaims Juliette Ponce.

But a heroine out of the pen ... of a man!

“A wink, to remind you that I love literature as a whole.

Obviously, I'm not going to stop reading men, she reassures.

But I mean:

also read women when they talk about nature, science, the industrial world.

»And that bad tongues be reassured.

“We will publish about ten books per year.

I will not do a heist on the French edition!

She smiles.