#3 The role of publishing in addressing gender-based and sexual violence

Episode 3
From the series Standing together: ESCP community united against gender-based and sexual violence

A conversation between Isabelle Beyneix, Associate Professor (HDR) in Private Law and Scientific Director of the MSc in Media at ESCP Business School, and Marie-Pierre Gracedieu (ESCP 99), co-founder & CEO, Le Bruit du Monde, who published “Mazan: an anthropology of a rape trial”.

Publishing as a space for independent and collective voices

Isabelle Beyneix: In 2021, you founded your own publishing house, Le Bruit du Monde, together with Adrien Servières, under the Editis Group, after having worked as a literary director and then as a series editor at Gallimard. Could you explain what motivated you to create your own publishing house? Did you feel that a particular voice was missing in the publishing landscape?

Marie-Pierre Gracedieu: I spent around fifteen years nurturing two remarkable collections of foreign literature, bringing forgotten classics back to light—such as works by Virginia Woolf or Stefan Zweig—while also introducing new voices like Sofi Oksanen and Anna Hope.
In 2020, a meeting with a member of the Editis Group made me realise that I now wanted to channel my energy and curiosity into a more personal project. I knew that I would continue to observe the world and the bold voices that seek to describe it, but I wanted to do so from Marseille—a city where I was certain to encounter stories different from those written in Paris.
I have had a close relationship with Marseille since my twenties and deeply appreciate both its cultural richness and its international dimension. I also wished to focus my efforts on publishing around ten titles per year. By partnering with Adrien, who had solid experience in distribution and bookselling, I knew I could rely on a strong ally to ensure that our books would reach journalists, booksellers and readers.

Isabelle: How do you work within the Editis Group (owned by Mr Daniel Křetínský since its acquisition from Vivendi in 2023)? Do you enjoy full editorial independence? What are the advantages of being affiliated with such a group?

Marie-Pierre: I have enjoyed complete editorial independence in the choice of the texts we publish since the creation of the publishing house in March 2021. Our authors often address political issues, but they do so by prioritising nuance and by avoiding clichés and oversimplifications.
Publishing “De notre monde emporté”, Christian Astolfi’s novel inspired by the closure of the shipyards in La Seyne-sur-Mer, involves both reflecting on the loss of skills and jobs and recalling the harsh working conditions endured by those workers.
The Editis Group provides us with the means to pursue our ambitions. It allows us to assume the risks inherent in publishing first novels or works of foreign literature. We benefit from the services of Interforum, a high-quality distributor, and from the support of group employees who handle the sale of subsidiary rights—paperback editions, foreign rights, film adaptations, and so on. Exchanging with these colleagues also allows us to gain perspective on our own activity. Establishing a publishing house that is open to the world, and based in Marseille, requires constant effort, and it is invaluable to draw on the experience of other publishers.

Gender-based violence, media responsibility and societal change

Isabelle: Your publishing house produces narratives and novels, and “Mazan, An Anthropology of a Rape Trial” is, to the best of my knowledge, your first collective essay dealing with a major social issue. What led you to embark on this new type of publication? Was it primarily the desire to address the Mazan rape cases? Do you envisage publishing further works on other societal issues?

Marie-Pierre: Each book is selected for its singularity. There is never any question of creating a collection or adhering to a predefined “type” of publication. We had previously been approached by journalists wishing to write about Mazan, but we declined, fearing overly immediate analyses or excessively personal viewpoints on the case.

In early January 2025, my attention was drawn to a LinkedIn post by an anthropologist from the Norbert Elias Centre, a CNRS research unit in Marseille. Lucille Florenza described the complex emotions she experienced upon returning from Avignon, where she had spent nearly two months with thirteen other anthropologists observing the Mazan trial—from inside the courthouse to café terraces and the surroundings of public institutions.

Intrigued by what appeared to be an extraordinary research experience in the social sciences, I invited her to meet me. A few weeks later, I discovered the first part of a narrative that finally enabled me to reflect on what Dominique Pélicot had inflicted on his wife, and above all on the collective and deeply intimate consequences of this case. I was struck by their ability to speak with a single voice about the unfolding of the case on the public stage of the city of Avignon, without ever sacrificing narrative tension or nuance.

I was also deeply moved by the collective voice they developed following the publication of the book, which allows us to grasp the strength of collective endeavour. I would very much like to experience similarly inspiring editorial projects in the field of social sciences. Other subjects could lend themselves to this approach, and some books might even reveal the existence of collectives engaged in missions of general interest that transform our lives. I am actively reflecting on this with several authors from the publishing house.

Isabelle: What is your assessment of the evolution of media coverage of violence against women?

Marie-Pierre: I was born at the end of the 1970s, and I therefore lived for a long time in a society that either silenced or relativised violence against women. I can only welcome the media attention these issues now receive. However, I regret the speed at which events succeed one another, with one case often eclipsing the previous one.

That is the nature of the media cycle, but I far prefer the space for reflection offered by books. It is essential to study these cases in depth and to reveal all the factors that “authorised” such violence, which often lie in the protagonists’ childhoods and education.

Isabelle: How do you explain the silence of men in relation to an exceptional case such as the Mazan affair?

Marie-Pierre: It is not easy to accept that a man could place his wife at the centre of such a system of violence, and that so many men could participate in it over so many years. I imagine that men may fear, more than women, being associated with such a figure—and yet the monster exists within each of us.

I have nevertheless observed that some men did not remain silent and that they too are searching for answers, hoping to find a way for shame to change sides.

Recognising and protecting rights: The legal response to gender-based violence in France