Depuis trente ans, la Maison des Écrivains Étrangers et des Traducteurs de Saint-Nazaire accueille en résidence des écrivains étrangers et des traducteurs du monde entier. Elle leur alloue une bourse et met à leur disposition un grand appartement au dixième étage du Building, au-dessus du port et des Chantiers navals.

Elle organise chaque année des rencontres littéraires internationales "meeting" et remet trois prix littéraires : le Prix Laure-Bataillon de la meilleure œuvre de fiction traduite en français dans l’année, le Prix Bernard Hœpffner et le Prix de la Jeune Littérature latino-américaine.

Residencies
The "Meet" welcomes one writer or translator at a time for four to eight weeks. The resident is allocated a weekly grant and accommodated in a large two-bedroom flat in the "Building", an emblematic high-rise overlooking the docks and the shipyards of Saint Nazaire Harbour, on the Loire River estuary. At the end of his/her stay, the resident is given the opportunity to have one of his works and its French translation published in the Meet's collection "Les Bilingues".

The writers and translators who wish to apply must send a biographical as well as a bibliographical note. Every application is considered by The Meet's literary council, a body of writers, translators and critics.

Saint Nazaire is a middle-size town located in the south of Brittany, on the Loire River estuary. It's only two and a half hours away from Paris by high-speed train. The nearest airport is Nantes Atlantique.

Literary prizes
The Meet organizes regular meetings with writers and translators and awards three literary prizes. The prix Laure-Bataillon rewards both the writer of a fictional work and his or her translator The prix Laure-Bataillon classique rewards the translator of a classical work. The prix de la jeune litérature latino-américaine - is awarded every other year, each time in a different South American country. It aims at honouring and publishing a young Latino writer selected by a jury of writers in his own country.

Every year the Meet asks about twenty writers from different countries to contribute a few pages on a literary topic. Their texts are then translated into French and published in a bilingual edition.

SELECTION A LIRE... Marion de Domincis Alexandre Toptchian Slovénie Antonio Gálvez Ronceros György Dragomán Juan Carlos Mondragón (vidéo) Susanne Jorn Gabriela Alemán Roberto Sosa Pierre Birnbaum Michel Volkovitch Premchand Vassilis Alexakis Slobodan Mickovič Jens Birkemose meet n°6 New Dehli / Bucarest Anne Colin du Terrail Kawakami Hiromi Marius Daniel Popescu Enrique Vila-Matas Salvatore Maldera Sattori Alexandru Vlad La mémoire juste meet n°7 Alger / La Havane Marie Hoogue Anna Kim Boris Pahor Alain Nicolas Pour l’engagement critique Extrait Conte Manuscrit de Saint-Nazaire Yasmine Chami Faruk SEHIC Asa Saint-Nazaire Rusomir Bogdanovski Charif Majdalani (Liban) Extrait revue meet n°06 Olga Tokarczuk Rokus Hofstede Lettonie Azerbaïdjan Ángel Lozada Mohamed Hmoudane Wolfgang Asholt Miljenko Jergović Minh TRAN HUY Mara ZALITE (vidéo) Danielle Losman Vlada Urošević Moncef Ghachem Extrait Eduardo HALFON Alan PAULS (vidéo) Jean-Paul Kauffmann Des écrivains dans la ville / Rétrospective 1990 Ernest Pignon-Ernest Vigdis Hjorth Ilmar LAABAN Extrait Délires simultanés Peter Rühmkorf Colm Tóibín Karla Suárez Derek Alton WALCOTT Lang Pengsiek Patrice Bougon Extrait Ion POP Extrait Salvatore MALDERA SATTORI Álvaro Menen Desleal Jean-Marie Laclavetine Arno Camenisch Felipe Troya Michelle Perrot