Saint Père Books

There is a publishing company in France deepening readers’ connections to their favorite authors with what they’ve deemed an impossible project: breathing life back into the dying art of the handwritten.

Inspired by a museum exhibition, Jessica Nelson and Nicholas Tretiakow decided to produce facsimiles of their favorite handwritten manuscripts, both classic and contemporary. Saint Père Books, named after the street where they met at university, was born by this adventurous idea to share beautifully restored original manuscripts with fellow literature lovers.

In a sunny office in Cambremet, France, rolling hills of apple orchards and a petite medieval town provide an idyllic backdrop to their literary project. Lewis Carroll hangs beside Jean Cocteau and Victor Hugo, bringing the space to life. It is here where, with a precise method of digitization and reproduction, the small team turns these literary fossils into beautiful books that carry not just their classic tales, but the personal touches of the authors who wrote them.

“We want to give the feeling that you’re bending over the shoulder of the writer as they are writing your favorite book,” explained Jessica.

Until recently, handwritten manuscripts have not held the same cultural significance as their first published editions. Now that most writers type their works on a computer, however, there is a renewed admiration for the handwritten, and a higher value placed on it. Believing that the manuscript adds an extra layer to the story of literature, Jessica and Nicholas built a business model that few people thought would last. Not only would it be difficult to find contemporary writers who handwrite, but many people questioned whether or not enough readers would be interested in the concept.

Amelie Nothomb was the perfect candidate for their trial run. She is beloved and contemporary and doesn’t own a computer. Luckily, Jessica had no trouble bringing her on board with the project; the two shared an alma mater and an appreciation for the handmade. With moderate success in their first facsimile manuscript, Hygiene and the Assassin, Saint Père Books gained some momentum with publishers and readers.

After their dive into the contemporary, Jessica and Nicholas began searching for classics, a treasure hunt through library archives, university safes, and museum records. Some were easy to obtain and took only a few months to publish. Others were more difficult, leading them on chases that took years.

The intimate connection one feels as they read their favorite classic in the exact penmanship of its author inspires the work that Jessica and Nicholas do. Jessica describes becoming an expert in Proust’s handwriting after sorting through thousands of pages of his notebooks on which he chaotically scribbled In Search of Lost Time. She was stunned to discover that, instead of a Madeleine, the infamous pastry that launches the epic’s protagonist into his past was originally a piece of toast, a detail that can only be found in one version of the original manuscript.

“Being used to a writer’s handwriting like this is like being in his head,” Jessica explained. “You feel the moments where he hesitates, when he’s stressed, tired, or angry because he can’t find the right word. It creates a very deep connection.”

Each project is developed by taking turns choosing which dream manuscript to make into a reality. A film buff, Nicholas was excited to find the original handwritten screenplay from The Contempt, adding to their shelves a diversity in form. They have also reproduced handwritten Serge Gainsbourg lyrics and Jean Cocteau drawings. They even reproduced one of the oldest known versions of the Bible, annotated with drawings and notes from the monk who transcribed it.

“We always want to surprise,” Nicholas said. “We are not focused on one specific trail or genre. We want to mix different languages, periods of time, subjects. We went for the Bible and Journey to the End of the Night at the same time. We publish musicians and philosophers. We hope to publish more drawings as well.”

SP Books has been expanding its own audience in recent years, adding the UK and the US to its distribution. F. Scott Fitzgerald’s American classic The Great Gatsby was the company’s first foray into American literature, and they are looking forward to expanding into more contemporary US works. They are also hoping to publish more manuscripts written in languages other than English or French, such as Russian and German.

A book by Saint Père will command any bookshelf with its regal size and superb quality. The team in Cambremet works tirelessly to ensure that every stroke of the author’s pen has been restored to give the reader an intimate experience on each page. Then, the files are outsourced to a high quality printer to ensure perfection in the finest final details; pin-straight spines, rich ink, and thick paper.

“It’s an impossible business,” explained Nicholas. “Every part is difficult. Regular books are easier to process and easier to sell, so working with manuscripts is way more challenging. The quantity of work we need to do to make this work is feasible only because we are so passionate about it.”

Looking ahead, Nicholas and Jessica feel hopeful that though theirs is a niche project, their readership will remain.

“I think it has something to do with the will of people to keep something from the past,” Jessica said. “They like to have something that evokes the time passing by. That is also why we decided to make big, beautiful books. We believe there’s space for this kind of object, even if we live in a virtual world.”

As parts of our lives speed faster into the digital world, analog forms once deemed old-fashioned have reemerged in communities that value preserving something of the past. Rising out of not just nostalgia, but a pursuit of authenticity within technology, forms like vinyl, film, and print have held their ground alongside their digital counterparts.

“As things move faster, the offer will be wider,” explained Nicholas. “The way to get books will be wider, and we will get all kinds of books out of it. It’s not better or worse, it’s just different. There is room for everybody.”

Failing to render past forms obsolete, the virtual world has instead expanded the ways in which we read. Ebooks, for example, offer a new way to read that is convenient for travelers and often less expensive than print books. When ebooks entered the market, readers, booksellers, and publishers feared that the end of print was near. Though paperback sales have diminished slightly, pixels have failed to replace pages entirely. Studies have found that most readers prefer to read in print, especially readers of younger generations who drive the digital revolution in other ways. Perhaps the two worlds are less at odds than we think.

Riley Mang is LAR’s Editor-at-Large. Based in France, she also teaches English and writes book reviews. Find more of her work here.