{"id":11916,"date":"2012-08-23T03:28:05","date_gmt":"2012-08-23T02:28:05","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.johncoulthart.com\/feuilleton\/?p=11916"},"modified":"2015-01-11T04:12:30","modified_gmt":"2015-01-11T03:12:30","slug":"chute-libre-science-fiction","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.johncoulthart.com\/feuilleton\/2012\/08\/23\/chute-libre-science-fiction\/","title":{"rendered":"Chute Libre science fiction"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"chutelibre01.jpg\"<\/p>\n

La Jungle Nue (A Feast Unknown, 1974). Illustration de Alain Le Saux.<\/em><\/p>\n

Chute libre means “free fall” in French, and here refers to an imprint of French publisher Champ Libre that from 1974 to 1978 reprinted a series of science fiction titles under that name. The imprint is notable for a number of reasons, not least the striking covers which impress with their uniform design and bold imagery. The combination of black cover with vivid artwork is very similar to the covers Penguin were producing<\/a> for their SF titles a few years earlier but since there’s little written anywhere about the French books I can’t say whether this was an influence or merely coincidence. I’ve not been able to find a complete list of all the illustrators either. At least two of the covers are the work of Moebius, rare examples of him being commissioned outside the comics medium.<\/p>\n

The other notable aspect of the imprint is the books themselves which are an odd mix of the outrageous and sexually provocative end of SF spectrum, together with more usual fare. Some of the covers play to the provocation more than is necessary: Michael Moorcock has always been pleased by the attention his work receives in France but I’ll bet he hates that cover. Several of these titles appeared as SF in the 1970s because of other work by their authors despite there being nothing overtly science fictional about The Atrocity Exhibition<\/em> or Breakfast in the Ruins<\/em>. Farmer’s A Feast Unknown<\/em> and The Image of the Beast\/Blown<\/em> are violent and sexually excessive, and feature little genre material, but managed to slide onto the SF shelves for the same reason. Every so often I wonder whether any of these books (or books like them) would be offered to, or accepted by, genre publishers today.<\/p>\n

As usual, if anyone can supply information about the missing illustrators then please leave a comment.<\/p>\n

\"chutelibre02.jpg\"<\/p>\n

Comme une B\u00eate (Image of the Beast, 1974). Illustration by Moebius.<\/em><\/p>\n

\"chutelibre03.jpg\"<\/p>\n

Les Culbuteurs de l’Enfer (Damnation Alley, 1974). Illustration by Jean-Claude Castelli.<\/em><\/p>\n

\"chutelibre04.jpg\"<\/p>\n

Le Chaos Final (The Men in the Jungle, 1974).<\/em><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\"chutelibre05.jpg\"<\/p>\n

Gare \u00e0 la B\u00eate (Blown, 1975). Illustration by Moebius.<\/em><\/p>\n

\"chutelibre06.jpg\"<\/p>\n

Les Pionniers du Chaos (Agents of Chaos, 1975).<\/em><\/p>\n

\"chutelibre07.jpg\"<\/p>\n

Vice Versa (The Tides of Lust aka Equinox, 1975).<\/em><\/p>\n

\"chutelibre08.jpg\"<\/p>\n

Le Bal des Schizos (Abraham Lincoln, Simulacrum\/We Can Build You, 1975). Illustration by Jacques Tardi.
\n<\/em><\/p>\n

\"chutelibre09.jpg\"<\/p>\n

La D\u00e9fonce Glogauer (Breakfast in the Ruins, 1975).<\/em><\/p>\n

\"chutelibre10.jpg\"<\/p>\n

Une Bourr\u00e9e Pastorale (Flesh, 1975).<\/em><\/p>\n

\"chutelibre11.jpg\"<\/p>\n

Venus Plus X (1976).<\/em><\/p>\n

\"chutelibre12.jpg\"<\/p>\n

Orgasmachine (1976).<\/em><\/p>\n

\"chutelibre13.jpg\"<\/p>\n

D\u00e9fense de Coucher (Raw Meat, 1976).<\/em><\/p>\n

\"chutelibre14.jpg\"<\/p>\n

La Foire aux Atrocit\u00e9s (The Atrocity Exhibition, 1976).<\/em><\/p>\n

\"chutelibre15.jpg\"<\/p>\n

Robot Blues (Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? 1976).<\/em><\/p>\n

\"chutelibre16.jpg\"<\/p>\n

Service d’Ordre (The Men Inside, 1976).<\/em><\/p>\n

\"chutelibre17.jpg\"<\/p>\n

Chacun son Tour (The Other Log of Phileas Fogg, 1977).<\/em><\/p>\n

\"chutelibre18.jpg\"<\/p>\n

Tendre R\u00e9seau (The Agency, 1977).<\/em><\/p>\n

\"chutelibre19.jpg\"<\/p>\n

Manque de Pot! (Galactic Pot-Healer, 1977).<\/em><\/p>\n

\"chutelibre20.jpg\"<\/p>\n

A Double Tranchant (The Samurai, 1977).<\/em><\/p>\n

\"chutelibre21.jpg\"<\/p>\n

Tarzan vous Salue Bien (Tarzan Alive, 1978).<\/em><\/p>\n

\"chutelibre22.jpg\"<\/p>\n

Elsewhere on { feuilleton }
\n\u2022 The book covers archive<\/a><\/p>\n

Previously on { feuilleton }
\n\u2022 Penguin science fiction<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

La Jungle Nue (A Feast Unknown, 1974). Illustration de Alain Le Saux. Chute libre means “free fall” in French, and here refers to an imprint of French publisher Champ Libre that from 1974 to 1978 reprinted a series of science fiction titles under that name. The imprint is notable for a number of reasons, not … Continue reading “Chute Libre science fiction”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[2,42,4,48,20],"tags":[3991,8191,3450,3992,137,65,253],"class_list":["post-11916","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-art","category-books","category-design","category-illustrators","category-science-fiction","tag-alain-le-saux","tag-chute-libre","tag-jean-giraud-moebius","tag-jean-claude-castelli","tag-jg-ballard","tag-michael-moorcock","tag-philip-jose-farmer"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pq7rV-36c","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.johncoulthart.com\/feuilleton\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11916","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.johncoulthart.com\/feuilleton\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.johncoulthart.com\/feuilleton\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.johncoulthart.com\/feuilleton\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.johncoulthart.com\/feuilleton\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11916"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.johncoulthart.com\/feuilleton\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11916\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.johncoulthart.com\/feuilleton\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11916"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.johncoulthart.com\/feuilleton\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11916"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.johncoulthart.com\/feuilleton\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11916"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}