I was sleeping in when I received the alert on my phone which made me fall out of bed and let out a happy curse from home. “Kevin Lambert wins the Medici. »
An extraordinary piece of news which concludes a wonderful and eventful autumn for the author of May our joy remain, this novel whose formidable destiny no one could have predicted. A superb social fresco unfolding around the character of Céline Wachowski, a famous Montreal architect of international renown who will experience a dizzying fall.
We wondered if he had any chances, having received the December prize last week in addition to having been selected in the first Goncourt list, because juries are usually keen to stand out from other literary prizes.
It is rather rare for an author, whoever he or she may be, to win more than one of the most coveted awards in France, which makes Kevin Lambert’s success exceptional. To be honest, I have tears in my eyes while writing this, because I believed in it at this price, which some secretly find more beautiful than Goncourt…
He thus becomes the third Quebec writer to receive the Medici, after Dany Laferrière in 2009 for The enigma of the return and Marie-Claire Blais in 1966 for A season in the life of Emmanuel. I was not born in 1966, but I remember the jubilation at the coronation of Laferrière, whom I had chased as I did with Kevin that fall. On this crazy day (another one!), he gave me a few minutes on the phone directly from the La Méditerranée restaurant, where the prize is awarded each year.
PHOTO GEOFFROY VAN DER HASSELT, AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE
Kevin Lambert with the members of the Médicis Prize jury, in Paris
“I don’t even know how I feel, I don’t realize it yet, I was sure I couldn’t have it,” he said, completely shaken. The fact of appearing alongside Marie-Claire Blais in the history of the Medici is probably what touches him the most, because he is a fervent admirer of the writer, also cited in the highlight of May our joy remain, in my opinion one of the most beautiful tributes in form to Blaisian writing. “She is present,” murmurs Lambert, referring to her book, but also, I have the impression, to this celebration of her talent.
Come to think of it, the Medici jury has been following Kevin Lambert since his beginnings, since his two previous novels, You’ll love what you killed And Roberval Quarrel, have found their way into his selections over the years. This time was the right one for May our joy remain, which made headlines all fall, even triggering a controversy on sensitive reading which did not cool the jury. “It’s touching, they’ve read me since the first book, it’s like a form of support, even if we don’t know each other,” notes Kevin Lambert. For me, it is recognition of this journey. What I understood was that it was the favorite book and that when I won the December prize, members of the jury said: “Ah, shit!”, but the literary argument won out. »
Kevin didn’t believe in his chances so much that he was cleaning the apartment that had been lent to him in Paris that morning, in addition to having accepted a radio interview at the time of the unveiling. It was when he received a message from a member of the jury who advised him to stay around that he realized that it could be possible.
When the winner was announced, Kevin’s face appeared all over the news feeds and his phone blew up, in his own words. He had the intuition to suspend his Facebook account that morning so as not to be invaded while he took a breath.
May our joy remain won with six votes to four in favor Farewell Tangier by Salma El Moumni. Lambert also competed in the finalists Suzanne and the writer by Eric Reinhardt and sad tiger by Neige Sinno, two other great favorites in this exciting new season, this shows the strength of this novel which was warmly praised in the French press. “ May our joy remain was almost unanimously unanimous among literary critics, for the accuracy of its social criticism and the audacity of its style”, we could read in The world after the price announcement, while Point wrote: “In his rendering of the excess that strikes the greats of this world, propelled into speculative bubbles likely to burst at any moment, Kevin Lambert brings to mind a young Balzac with the accent of Xavier Dolan”…
The whirlwind is almost over for Kevin Lambert, even if he is still in the running for the Goncourt of high school students and the Goncourt of prisoners, but we suspect that the impact of the Medici will be felt for a long time to come, particularly in Quebec, where we feel that all local literature is honored by his victory. After celebrating his prize in Paris, he will treat himself to a well-deserved week of vacation in Italy. “It’ll feel good,” he admits. At the moment, I am happy, but underneath all that, there is still moral and physical exhaustion, I have to preserve myself. »
For my part, I must thank him for the joy over the months and also for picking up the phone for each of my calls during this particularly exciting literary season, which will be remembered for a long time.
What is the Medici?
The Médicis, which has a grant of 1000 euros (a little less than $1500), has been awarded since 1958. It is one of the most prestigious autumn literary prizes in France, described as “the ‘anti-Goncourt’ because it was created to crown a work whose author does not yet have a reputation corresponding to his talent.