Selfies

Sylvie Weil is the author of fiction and non-fiction works published in France and, in English translation, in the USA. The daughter of Andre Weil, one of the twentieth century's most brilliant mathematicians (and a founding member of Bourbaki) and the niece of Simone Weil, one of its most important philosophers, Sylvie was born in the United States but was raised in Paris. She now divides her time between Paris and New York City. After teaching French literature in several American universities she devoted herself to writing. Her critically acclaimed memoir 'Chez les Weil' was translated and published in several languages, in English by Northwestern University Press in 2010 (At Home with Andre and Simone'). She has published several collections of short stories and has contributed stories to literary magazines. Her fiction work for young adults has won the prestigious Prix Sorcieres in France.

'A beguiling series of vignettes, by turns wry, amusing and disturbing, inspired by self-portraits by women artists and reflecting on the images they provoke. An illuminating survey of the author's various identities, in a fractured world, as mother, lover and writer.' - Michele Roberts. 'A new genre is born: the short selfie collection! Lively, inventive, compassionate, aching, morally complex and troubling, I loved these self-portraits more than anything I've read lately.' - Lauren Elkin. 'In Selfies Sylvie Weil uses a work of an artist to set the theme for a snapshot of a past episode in her life. These selfies are exquisite vignettes - intelligent, witty, observant, sometimes poignant, and beautifully written - the elegance of the original French apparent in this fine English translation.' - Piers Paul Read . 'If yesteryear's painted self-portraits were as concerned with pose and presentation as are today's phone selfies, Sylvie Weil is the ideal analyst of what may lie behind the image. In a sequence of transpositions of the work of women portraitists from the Renaissance onwards, she applies their appearance to her experience, and implies a continuity in women's self-presentation. Like them, Sylvie Weil has an illustrious heritage (daughter to Andre a brilliant and renowned mathematician; niece to Simone, a brilliant and renowned philosopher). Unlike them, she moves from the visual to the verbal, expressive of both profound truth and imagination.' - Amanda Hopkinson.Reviews of Sylvie Weil's 'At Home with Andre and Simone', published by Northwestern University Press, USA, 2010 : `...an elegant and witty memoir-cum-reflection.' -The Spectator. 'Sylvie Weil's memoir is simply one of the best books I've read in the past decade. At turns poignant, poetic, and deeply personal' - Paul LeClerc, president, The New York Public Library. 'The missing link in the story of Andre and Simone Weil is Sylvie Weil, daughter of the great mathematician, niece of the legendary philosopher. In her memoirs... the 'merely' personal is transformed into something rich and strange.' -Palle Yourgrau, author of A World Without Time: The Forgotten Legacy of Goedel and Einstein.

• 13 chapters including Self-portrait at the organ, Self-portrait as a capital letter, Self-portrait with postcard, Self-portrait as a visitor, Self-portrait with portrait of my son, Self-portrait as a Chinese mushroom, Self-portrait with dog, Stabat mater, Self-portrait as an author, Self-portrait on the beach, Self-portrait as a maker of idols, Self-portraits in fugitive mirrors, Photobomb selfie.