ABSTRACT
The institutional and cultural network in which women’s bestsellers are situated equally affect both the types of books which are written and the place they occupy in the overall literary world. The commercial bestseller as it is known in the United States is a relatively recent phenomenon in France, dating only from the post Second World War industrial boom. The prize system has come under attack by both the reading public and publishers, who feel slighted or underrepresented at the moment the winners are announced. Attitudes in France towards the growing importance of the bestseller system remain, at best, ambivalent. Patterns of production, distribution, and sales of books naturally affect both the composition of the readership and the general attitude of readers towards the books they read. The equation of books sales with supermarket or drugstore products has met with fierce resistance. Critiques leveled against the bookclubs in France echo those made against supermarket booksales.
