Here are the draft pages for translations in French. With 36 of Nabokov’s books translated into French and issued in 126 editions, it is clear that Nabokov has been better received in France than in any non-Anglophone or non-Russophone country except possibly Germany. Since 1933 when Fayard published Защита Лужина [The Luzhin defense] as La course du fou in both a limited state and a trade state, Fayard, Gallimard, Julliard, Grasset, and several dozen smaller houses have continuously been producing translations in hardcover and paperback trade editions, limited editions, boxed sets, book club editions, and even as an unbound pack of postcards (the memoir/story Mademoiselle O in Nabokov’s original French, and therefore an A item).

Nabokov was fluent in French and carefully checked the translations of his works into French with the same care he took with the translations of his Russian works into English.