The French/English connection. (Flammarion, publishing in English and French)(International Supplement)

The French/ English Connection

We've gotten used to, say, a Kodansha publishing American books in in America. And why not? When Encyclopedia Britannica started up in Tokyo it was selling English-language reference books into Japanese households, and today at least one American publisher - Abbeville - publishes in Japanese (upcoming titles include Private New York by Chippy Irvine, with photos by Alex McLean). Publishing in somebody else's territory, even in thy neighbor's tongue, seems to be here to stay. Almost without fanfare, it is replacing more traditional copublishing arrangements, with all the coordinating and calculating and currency write-offs that system demanded. And so Thames & Hudson becomes a French publisher with a French list and a Paris address. Prestel-Verlag goes English. Even a cut-price art house, like Cologne's Benedikt Taschen, does the same midmarket art books in …