Prix Goncourt 2020: Which novel is most likely to win today?<

The impatient, by Djaïli Amadou Amal (Emmanuelle Collas), the anomaly, of Hervé Le Tellier (Gallimard), Theseus, his new life, by Camille de Toledo (Verdier) and the historiographer of the Kingdom, of Maël Renouard (Grasset), are the four finalist novels of a somewhat special goncourt 2020, since it took from the first selections deliberate remotely.

"It is a good start but I have known more beautiful. There is not like the other years a book that watches, where we say that it is the cream of milk", Confiedidier Decoin, president of the Goncourt Academy, interviewed by Franceinfo."This year our four finalists like us," he adds, being careful not to give clues to the final choice, which will be decided on November 30, still from a distance.

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Which of these four novels will take the song?A hazardous prognosis, as "the books are extremely different", estimates Didier Decoin."This final is very special because we could expect in the background, with everything that happened in the year and the previous year, to have novels that were talking about the contemporary," notes Didier Decoin.

"Apart from the novel by Djaili Amadou Amal, the others are really fiction, but without taking into account the problems that French society has been able to spot since the last Goncourt. There could have been a book on the end of the EmpireAmerican, you see, major themes that really affect French society, "adds the president of Goncourt."When Leila Slimani published her book, she posed a French sociological problem, it was a book that arrived in the midst of a crisis and which very largely deserved the Goncourt. It was obvious very quickly so much it was in line with the concerns of theCompany ", notes Didier Decoin," this year less ", he concludes.

To get an idea of the four CRU finalists 2020, here is an overview of each of the four novels in the final square.

"The impatients", by Djaïli Amadou Amal: a novel "Punch" against obscurantism and submission to men

It is one of the great current feathers of Africa, which carries the voice of women victims of violence, forced marriages, excision, rape ... We did not necessarily expect it in Goncourt, but his book, the impatient, whotells the story of three of these women and their fight for freedom takes the reader to the guts, without concession, but without voyeurism.A novel "punch" against obscurantism and submission to men via religious dogmatism which extends in Africa which, if he obtains the recognition of the jurors of the Goncourt, could give visibility to a feminist fight worthy heirlights.

"The book by Djaïli Amadou Amal is poignant, because it is a true story, it is something that happens to a lot of women," said Didier Decoin."Many books are published today, much too much. When you publish a book it is because it is believed that this book can change something. This text is essential," says the editor EmmanuelleCollas, interviewed by Franceinfo."It is a good book, it is a beautiful writing, incisive, strong powerful. It is a universal text, which speaks to all women, which makes sense and gives all its value to what literature is", adds the editor.(Emmanuelle-Collas, 252 pages, 17 euros).

"The anomaly" by Hervé Le Tellier: a demanding and entertaining novel

The novel by Hervé Le Tellier, "Oulipien" punctuated as a TV series, tells the story of an event on board an Air France plane during a flight between New York and Paris, which goesupset the life of passengers, but also the face of the world.This novel, written as a television series script, is a clever construction game whose pieces are fitted to perfection to tell a "surreal" story.Falsely anticipation, this novel with a thousand facets, but above all philosophical, actually questions us about our present, about the world in which we live today, by suggesting crazy hypotheses: and if the world was ultimately only'A gigantic computer simulation whose human beings are simple, more or less intelligent programs?

The anomaly is also a hymn to the Oulipo (Ouvroir of potential literature), of which Hervé Le Tellier has been the president since 2019. This literary movement launched in the 1960s among others by Raymond Queneau, and counting among his followers of writers such asWhether Georges Perec, Italo Calvino, or artists like Marcel Duchamps or Clémentine Mélois, intends to produce a "literature under constraint", the Oulipian author being "a rat that builds the labyrinth from which he proposes to go out"."Le Tellier's book is new in the literary landscape," said Didier Decoin laconically.In short, the anomaly is a novel that is both demanding and entertaining, which places it, if it is necessary to put one, at the top of the forecasts.(Gallimard, 336 pages, 20 euros)

"Theseus, his new life" by Camille de Toledo: a UFO

The writer Camille de Toledo slips into this final square with a singular book composed of texts and photographs in black and white, which tells the story of an abyssal introspection started a few years after the suicide of his brother Jérôme, in 2005. After trying to resume a new life by going into exile in Berlin, Thésée is caught up in its past, which manifests itself by pain in the whole body, which paralyzes it. He then decides to open the archive boxes and carefully observes the photographs of the family, exhumes the letters of the ancestors. He meditates, learns to breathe, and thus succeeds in connecting, attaching, building bridges between generations, glimpse echoes between dramas, observing mirrors between dates, and going back to the truth of a family history erased by his ancestors . Through his body, through matter, "who knows infinitely more than us", Theseus understands how much his being "carries the trace of the violence suffered over several generations", and how much the break with this past has produced a story that does not stop stuttering. The material is also at the heart of the writing of Camille de Toledo. Written in the first person, sometimes in the third, this novel is like textured, with sliding in the thread of the text of photographs, italics, prose poems, beginnings of sentences without capital letters, irregular arrangements. "Camille de Toledo's book may be literally more advanced than the others, well written, but not a crazy gaiety," summarizes Didier Decoin. By crowning this novel, the jury would not choose the way of ease, "but finally we do not crowd a fun book", underlines the president of the Goncourt. Here, we really liked this book, which questions the real, both our intimacy, and our common history of human beings, and our present, in an unusual way. (Verdier, 250 pages, 18.50 euros)

"The Kingdom Historiographer", by Maël Renouard: a certain classicism of writing brought up to date

From an ordered language, the author, which was also a time the pen of François Fillon, writes the fate of a modest scholar in the shadows, companion of study of King Hassan II.He describes the ascent, the graces and the disgreishes, due to the arbitrariness of power.An exceptional destiny that he does not master, but that Maël Renouard makes us cross with him.The opportunity to reflect on these shadow advisers of kingdoms (and republics?), Who have always oscillated between docility and boldness in the face of power.For Didier Decoin, Maël Renouard's novel "is a wonderfully well documented and written book, it is curious to have gone to seek this Moroccan story, that makes a great novel, but it is a little less concerning".A goncourt would be the recognition of a certain classicism of writing brought up to date.(Grasset, 330 pages, 22 euros)