OPEN TO THE POESIA OF THIERRY METZ (meeting reading)
When: 17.10.2026 19:00
Where: 48.863702, 2.359974
Organizer: Admin
As part of the mental health information weeks, the Marguerite Audoux library will organize two events.
The first, a writing workshop, will take place on the barge l’Adamant, a floating day center for adults suffering from mental disorders. The second will take place at the library. It will be a reading‑meeting dedicated to the work of Thierry Metz.
Laborer, mason, agricultural worker, Thierry Metz died in 1997, at the age of forty, leaving behind a considerable, dense, profound poetic oeuvre composed of short texts. Thierry Metz is notably the author of "Journal d'un manoeuvre", the book that made him known, and of "l’homme qui penche", written during a stay at the psychiatric hospital of Cadillac, in Gironde, while he was battling alcohol and depression.
Credits: DR
In September 2025, Gallimard editions gathered in one volume six collections of the poet titled Lettres à la bien aimée et autres poèmes. It is prefaced by Isabelle Lévesque and post‑faced by Éric Vuillard.
The evening will be hosted by Isabelle Lévesque, together with Marie Violaine Brincard, director of a film about Thierry Metz, and Françoise Metz, the beloved of the collection. Isabelle Lévesque’s artist books will be exhibited at the library as well as works loaned by the Galerie Papiers d’art. A bibliography on workers’ poetry will be offered to the public.
Credits: Gallimard
Ahead of the evening a writing workshop will be organized on the Adamant around Thierry Metz’s poetic work. The participants will be half patients of the Adamant and half library users, who will discover on this occasion the « Adamant » care structure, its library, its bar, its artistic creation workshops, its radio … The date has not yet been set.
The texts will be read later at the library, at the end of the evening.
Isabelle Lévesque was born and lives in Normandy. She writes a poetry column for Quinzaines (la Nouvelle Quinzaine littéraire) and collaborates with Europe as well as Terres de femmes, Diérèse and Terre à ciel. She received in 2018 the international Francophone Poetry prize Yvan‑Goll for Voltige! (2017). She enjoys working with painters (Jean‑Gilles Badaire, Christian Gardair, Colette Deblé, Gaetano Persechini, Caroline François‑Rubino, Marie Alloy, Fabrice Rebeyrolle) and especially collaborating on the creation of artist books.
Marie‑Violaine Brincard is a French director, holder of the agrégation in Modern Literature. After having worked many years in Rwanda and dedicating a first essay to a survivor of the Tutsi genocide: D'un monde à l'autre (2007), Marie‑Violaine Brincard made Au nom du Père, de tous, du ciel, a film repeatedly awarded at festivals. Her later projects, which she now co‑directs with Olivier Dury (in 2014, L'homme qui penche in 2020), follow a similar political and aesthetic approach: to provide a visibility space for those who lack it.
Françoise Metz
Françoise Metz was the inspirer of many poems. She was the first reader of what Thierry Metz wrote and helped him in his life as an intermittent worker to make room for writing moments under harsh material conditions. She also played an important role in the evolution of his writing.
Trailer of the film "l'Homme qui penche" directed by Marie‑Violaine Brincard and Olivier Dury
Tags: workshop, mental health, reading, poetry
Source: https://www.paris.fr/evenements/s-ouvrir-a-la-poesie-de-thierry-metz-115201
Open in Vibelocate · Markdown