As part of the Rendez-vous littéraires rue Cambon [Literary Rendezvous at Rue Cambon], the podcast "les Rencontres" highlights the birth of a writer in a series imagined by CHANEL and House ambassador and spokesperson Charlotte Casiraghi.

Listen to author and critic Erica Wagner in conversation with Rachel Eliza Griffiths, writer of “Promise”, her first novel published by John Murray in 2023. Together, they talk about the singularity of her artistic path, influenced by different creative processes in which writing and visual art complement each other. They also reflect on the deep bond that connects her to her mother who is the main inspiration of her novel.

(00:00 ) Introduction

(00:42 ) Presentation of Rachel Eliza Griffiths and her novel “Promise” by Erica Wagner

(03:21 ) On the author’s early vocation as an artist and a writer

(04:43 ) The writers who inspire her

(11:28 ) On choosing 1950’s Maine as the backdrop of her novel

(15:06 ) Her novel as a love letter to her mother

(19:45 ) On the publication process of her novel

(21:49 ) Reading an extract of “Promise” by Rachel Eliza Griffiths

(24:42 ) On the writing process of her novel

(27:17 ) Her first reader

(29:01 ) The most enjoyable and challenging aspects of writing

(31:29 ) On the reception of the book

(36:14 ) The ending questionnaire of “les Rencontres”

Rachel Eliza Griffiths, Promise, © Rachel Eliza Griffiths, Random House, 2023.

Rachel Eliza Griffiths, Promise © John Murray Press, 2023.

Kirkus Reviews.

© Publisher's Weekly.

Seeing the Body by Rachel Eliza Griffiths © 2020 by Rachel Eliza Griffiths, published by W. W. Norton & Company, 2020.

© Hurston/Wright Foundation.

© Paterson Poetry Prize.

© NAACP Image Awards.

© Cave Canem Foundation Inc.

© Kimbilio.

© Fine Arts Work Center in Provincetown.

© Yaddo.

© The New York Times Company. All rights reserved. Used under license.

© The New Yorker.

© Tin House.

© Sarah Lawrence College.

Quote copyright © 2023 by Rachel Eliza Griffiths, from Cover reveal: See the cover for Rachel Eliza Griffiths’s Promise, published in LITHUB, February 23, 2023, used by permission of The Wylie Agency, LLC

© LITHUB.