An American In Paris

Why Paris?
The “Roses Anglaises” party in Gallimard’s headquarterd in Paris last Monday was Antoine Gallimard’s idea (one of the 42 publishers of the book): because of his beautiful gardens, the venue was a sort of echo to the roses in the
book. Madonna accepted the proposal immediately.
“She loves France and considers Gallimard as one of the most important publishers
worldwide”, said Émilie Gaubert, from the public relations office which has been managing the event, which had some 350 guests – of
which “50 being children, because it will be a party for them, with ballons and fancy make-up: after all, it’s all about a children’s book”, adds
Hewige Pasquet, director of Gallimard Jeunesse.

Among the thirty publishers invited, Chantale Lalonde, director of the french branch of Éditions Scholastic, which publishes the french
version of the book, “Les Roses Anglaises”, in North America. The french translation is by Jean-François Ménard, the translator of the
Harry Potter books. But we didn’t make any modification to the version published by Gallimard, to better match our local market”, explains
Mrs. Lalonde.

She also points out that the publishing of “Les Roses Anglaises” will have, at the beginning, two and a half the size of the average Scholastic
edition and that, in Québec, pre-sales have reached 11.500 copies at the moment. The book, whith a suggested retail price of 27.99
canadian dollars, has the format of a hardback volume with printed glossy jacket, just like in the United States, where it is published by Callaway, which also took care of the packaging design.

With Madonna
“Each time with have comments about the book layout or a prototype to display. we send it to Callaway, and they wait for Madonna’s

feedback in order to give us the final approval. What about her… I don’t know if it’s Madonna herself or her entourage, but we’ve always been told that she was very positive in the work, and she was always adding the final touch, the ribbon to embellish the gift box.”, says Mrs. Lalond,

showing who is she happy with this experience.
“We have a strong presence in schools, and we feel very protective towards this market. We therefore analyzed the five books carefully

before accepting to publish them”.

From an original article by Sonia Sarfati, La Presse, Paris
Thanks to Madonna Electronica