Jakuta Alikavazovic presents 'Like a Sky Inside'

Third Place Books is pleased to welcome French author and translator Jakuta Alikavazovic as part of her U.S. tour for Like a Sky Inside, translated into English by Daniel Levin Becker. This event is free and open to the public.

This event is a part of Villa Albertine’s Authors on Tour program. Jakuta Alikavazovic’s 2024 U.S. tour is made possible by Villa Albertine and the author's U.S. publisher Fern Books, with additional cultural and financial support from the Alliance Française de Seattle and the French and Italian Department at the University of Washington.

For important updates, registration is highly recommended in advance. This event will include a public signing and time for audience Q&A. Sustain our author series by purchasing a copy of the featured book!

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About Like a Sky Inside. . .

A young new mother spends the night alone in the Louvre ruminating about her father, who after each of their many visits to the Louvre would ask just how she'd go about stealing the Mona Lisa.

Let's go back even further, my father said. It's not even certain that the original purpose of what we call art was to be seen.

In a way, we could go so far as to say that art, what we call art, is made less to be seen than to be stolen.

Winner of the Prix Medicis Essai 2021

In March 2020, a young woman spends the night in the Louvre. At home: her nine-month-old son. In her overnight bag: a notebook, a toiletry kit, a duvet, a cube of nougat, and something that shouldn't be there. In her head: memories of the Venus de Milo, of land art and the American road, of romance and travel and immigration and war —and of her father, who after each of their many visits to the Louvre would ask just how she'd go about stealing the Mona Lisa. An insightful and heartfelt meditation on the possibilities and impossibilities of art, on parenthood and the betrayals of growing up, on foreignness and belonging, and on the secret conversations between our souls and the places that linger in our dreams.

About Villa Albertine

Villa Albertine is a cultural institution that supports exchanges in arts and ideas between the United States, France, and beyond. With outposts in 10 US cities—Atlanta, Boston, Chicago, Houston, Los Angeles, Miami, New York, New Orleans, San Francisco, and Washington, DC—Villa Albertine presents innovative programming nationwide including 50+ customized residencies for international artists, thinkers, and cultural leaders across disciplines each year; a series of cross-cultural dialogues and events; a magazine and podcast; and grants, resources, and incubator programs for professionals in the cultural sphere.

Villa Albertine is an institution of the Embassy of France in the United States. Learn more at villa-albertine.org.

Jakuta Alikavazovic was born in Paris to a family of Bosnian and Montenegrin origins. Her parents settled in France in the early 1970’s and Jakuta Alikavazovic was brought up bilingual, with close ties to her Bosnian and Montenegrin relatives. In 2008, she was awarded the prestigious Goncourt Prize for a first novel and more recently, the Médicis Prize for non-fiction with her latest work Like A Sky Inside (Comme un ciel en nous, Stock; trans. by Daniel Levin Becker, Fern Books, 2024). She is also a columnist for the French newspaper Libération and the translator into French of authors including Toni Morrison and Daniel Foster Wallace. (Photo credit: Francesca Mantovani)

About Third Place Books

Founded in 1998 in Lake Forest Park, Washington, Third Place Books is dedicated to the creation of a community around books and the ideas inside them. With locations in Lake Forest Park and Seattle's Ravenna and Seward Park neighborhoods, Third Place Books is proud to serve the entire Seattle metro area. Learn more about their event series at thirdplacebooks.com/events.