Lucie Taïeb

Les échappées

the Breakaways

September 5, 2019
Novel
180 pages
140 × 185 mm
18 €
9782377560349
978-2-3775-6034-9
																Lucie Taïeb, Les échappées
																Lucie Taïeb, Les échappées

“Don’t get me wrong, though. I’m not saying your story isn’t the real thing. I’m just saying it’s not strong enough against theirs. And you have already understood—as you are keeping it quiet—, that it is always better to be on the side of the strongest stories in a family with divergent histories, and in the current and future world.”

In the middle of summer, a foreign girl disturbs the gloomy daily life of Oskar and his sister, who live with their parents in a small house on the edge of a disused railway line. Parallel to this tale of initiation, where the shadow of a drama hangs over a society entirely devoted to work and the enslavement of minds and bodies. In this universe there is a discourse of terror, the promise of a terrible threat that is about to come and that only Stern, a placid heroine, a poet more than a warrior, dares to defy.
Over the course of four eventful seasons, Les échappées weaves a tale of emancipation through movement. We follow women who have chosen to flee out by courage, to save themselves and their loved ones, to escape an authoritarian and false word, an oppressive and destructive power. In two parallel plots, Lucie Taïeb writes a drama that sets isolated individuals in the intimate and political spheres in opposition to a power that could crush them, but from which they manage to free themselves.

Awarded Prix Wepler 2019
The author

Lucie Taïeb was born in Paris in 1977. She is a teacher and researcher and has published texts in reviews, essays (Territoires de mémoire, Les Classiques Garnier, 2012), two short story collections (Tout aura brûlé, Les Inaperçus, 2013, La retenue, LansKine, 2015) and several translations from German (Cruellement là, by Friederike Mayröcker, Atelier de l’Agneau, 2014). She won the 2019 Wepler Prize for Les échappées.

Press

“Coming from poetry, Lucie Taïeb gives the novel a broad, sober voice, calling on the reader to escape the dominant fictions and contribute to his dream.”

Alain Nicolas, L’Humanité.

“This poetic text praises the indocility, the courageous refusal against the destructive commandments of a tyrannical power.”

Ian Brossat, Libération.
September 5, 2019
Novel
180 pages
140 × 185 mm
18 €
9782377560349
978-2-3775-6034-9