Each month, as part of the “Reading for All” program, the City of Nice invites a writer to engage with schools, middle schools, high schools, at Lenval and L’Archet II Hospital in the City of Nice and the Nice Côte d’Azur Urban Community, as well as the detention center. For the month of April, the guest writer is Catherine Hermary Vieille.
This initiative aims to combat illiteracy and allows students to meet writers who share with them their journey towards writing.
This year, writers such as René Frégni, Aurélie de Gubernatis, Bernard Deloupy, Franz Olivier Giesbert, Eric Fottorino, Gonzague Saint Bris, and Laurent Seksik have already taken turns.
“Reading for All” is a unique initiative in France, which has been in existence since September 2008.
-Catherine Hermary Vieille is a French novelist and biographer. She studied in Paris and then in Greenwich (United States). She currently lives in Charlottesville, Virginia, and divides her time between writing, her farm, and numerous trips to France.
She is a member of the Pen Club Islam-West and the Association of French Language Writers.
She has won several awards: the Prix Fémina for “Le grand vizir de la nuit” (1981), the Prix Ulysse for “L’épiphanie des dieux” (1983), the Prix RTL for “L’Infidèle” (1985), and the Prix des Maisons de la presse for “Un amour fou” (1991). Her most recent publications are “Merveilleuses” in 2011 and “Les Années Trianon” in 2010, published by Albin Michel.
Following her first participation in the Reading for All Operation, Catherine Hermary Vieille stated: “During these four days, I received far more than I gave. Each ‘journey’ to different schools was an immersion into different worlds, some serene and bright, others stormy, surrounded by barriers but all carrying messages, spoken or unspoken, which the writer delights in interpreting. Each day, like a progression towards the essential, brought a little more joy, as well as significant efforts to establish a conversation, not to ‘lose’ the young audience by boring them or offering them ready-made phrases. The contact with this still open, trusting, and spontaneous generation must in no way be severed.
-Schedule of meetings:
Monday, April 16, 2012: 8:45-11:30 > Baumettes 1 School – 23 rue Dante – Nice- 13:45-15:30 > Col de Villefranche School – avenue José Bernard – Nice
Tuesday, April 17, 2012: 8:45-10:30 > Corniche Fleurie School – Corniche Fleurie – Nice- 13:00-15:00 > Roland Garros Middle School – 10 bd de Cimiez – Nice
Wednesday, April 18, 2012: 9:00-10:00 > Henri Matisse Middle School – avenue Reine Victoria – Nice
Thursday, April 19, 2012: 8:45-11:30 > Baumettes 2 School – 26 rue Dante – Nice- 13:30-15:30 > Risso Middle School – 8 boulevard Pierre Sola – Nice
Friday, April 20, 2012: 8:45-11:00 > Auber School – 35 rue Auber – Nice
