Michel Houellebecq

[Anonymous No.14272532]

Did you read anything by him? Did you enjoy it?

[Anonymous No.14272553]

>>14272532
gonna read Whatever soon
hope it doesn't ruin my mood for the next few months

[Anonymous No.14272606]

Soumission. Inenjoued it a lot, it was one of the few fiction books I read last year (most were about economics, philosophy and history).so it came out as a breeze of fresh air. I didnt expect it to be so down to earth, lewd in many aspects, it tries to be relatable.

Ill prolly read some more in the future.

[Anonymous No.14272669]

>>14272606
Currently half way through it, French isn't my native language but I'm surprised by how easily legible it is

[Anonymous No.14272713]

>>14272532
Read Les Particules Elementaires. 10/10

[Anonymous No.14272721]

>>14272532
Yes. Did I enjoy it? No. Would I recommend it? No. Was it a good book? It was great.

[Anonymous No.14272784]

>>14272532
The Elementary Particles was great. Especially if you're a guy and you have or have had trouble getting laid all your life. It's a book you can relate to greatly without feeling like you're being pandered to.

Wish I knew french so I could read him in his native language.

[Anonymous No.14272795]

>>14272532
I don't read any fiction written after 1940.

[Anonymous No.14272810]

Read The Elementary Particles and The Possibility of an Island this year. Currently reading Serotonin. The Elementary Particles was great. I wonder if it has had something like a Werther effect. It’s been a month since I’ve finished it and I’m still in a funk.

[Anonymous No.14272840]

Are the translations any good? I've heard people say that his prose is unexceptional

[Anonymous No.14272851]

He's memed here so much for a reason. Goblin in appearances as he maybe, his writing holds his reputation on merit alone. Everything of his I did read, I enjoyed. That would be Whatever, The Elementary Particles, and Submission. Hoping to get my hands on a copy of Serotonin soon.

[Anonymous No.14272854]

>>14272713
This. And all of his other works.
Speaking as a Frenchman having read all of his novels and novellas, he's the author who most truly captures the French zeitgeist, no sugarcoating.
His works are centered on characters, their environment, and their relationships. Throughout his work you see the shift of French society to a neoliberal simulacrum of a world.
Alienated characters, looking for love in a world dominated by narcissistic, perverse impulsions.
The loss of history and culture in France, replaced by an omnipresent media and branding system. It's about what it happens to people who are unfit to be members of a third-sector, capitalist, critically-alientated society.

He is reviled by many in France.
I was very depressed reading Les Particules Elementaires, but also deeply impressed by his perceptiveness. I went on to read the rest of his prose and found that his work will definitely instill in you a sense of morbid serenity,seeing the world so perverted; his writing will take you through a raw, human tour of French lives in the contemoprary era.

Also he is very lewd~

[Anonymous No.14272887]

>>14272532
the original blackpiller

[Anonymous No.14272906]

>>14272854
>his work will definitely instill in you a sense of morbid serenity

That's a wonderful description of the feeling I got reading The Elementary Particles anon. I think his work illustrates a lot more than just modern French life though. It rings bells in all of the modern 1st world imo.

[Anonymous No.14272942]

>>14272906
Thanks.
Yeah, he captures the sensation you get when you step out of any airport, "Wow, it's all the fucking same."
Complete cultural uniformisation, all devoted to captialist accumjulation

[Anonymous No.14272981]

>>14272854
Pretty much this. Though I think the zeitgeist he captures is very relevant to most of Europe. His protagonists are productive members of the society in more classical terms, he captures the social isolation and alienation very well. How depressing life becomes, when appearance and youth become the most valued qualities, as life mostly consists of getting older. How liberation of sex has actually decreased the amount of sex people have. Best writer alive.

[Anonymous No.14273009]

>>14272981
Best writer but beware, the Red Pill has no safety net.

[Anonymous No.14273037]

what book do you guys recommend first? i went to a bookstore and picked up platform as it was the only one they had and im wondering which i should read next. seems like elementary particles is the most popular on a site like goodreads but submission and serotonin look more interesting to me from what ive read. what do you think

[Anonymous No.14273044]

>>14273037
Just read elementary particles. You’ll like it.

[Anonymous No.14273050]

>>14273009
Houellebecq is fantasic, best writer I have tripped on in years.

[Anonymous No.14273051]

>>14273037
Elementary Particles may be Houellebecq's opus
Submission is unlike most of his other novels, it's a historical fiction, it describes the rise to power of a party called the 'Muslim Brothers'. I learned new things about Islam, French history and the history of Islam in France from it
Serotonin is one of his newer works, and imo not essential to understanding him as an author

[Anonymous No.14273063]

>>14273044
>>14273051
alright thanks

[Anonymous No.14273064]

>>14272532
He'll be canon in 200 years.

[Anonymous No.14273076]

>>14273064
In 200 years the Sino-Chi'ite coalition will have banned all decadent literature

[Anonymous No.14273164]

>>14272532
/ourguy/

[Anonymous No.14273207]

>>14272795
surely you mean 1945

[Anonymous No.14273364]

>>14272854
How would you rate his prose in French, on a scale of 1 to 10?

[Anonymous No.14273543]

>>14273207
Well I mean LOTR was published quite later so it's on a case-by-case basis, but pre-1940 is a pretty good guideline for my interests.

[Anonymous No.14273633]

>>14272532
I refuse to read him because he reminds me too much of myself, and I don't want to be like him when I'm older.

[Anonymous No.14273884]

>>14272532
>that scene in Elementary Particles where the dying old man from the satanist cult is trying to grope the little girl before he dies, then her seeing his vertebrae in the pyre after he's cremated

disgusting stuff, but it sticks with you. I also read and loved Platform and Whatever

[Anonymous No.14274015]

>>14273884
>disgusting stuff, but it sticks with you.
Exactly, I always remember the oral sex scene while watching torture snuff videos.

[Anonymous No.14274145]

>>14273633
it's inescapable but Houellebecq shows that it can be fucking funny en route

[Anonymous No.14274494]

>>14272532
Read Whatever and I loved it, he really did establish the modern day incel (for lack of a better term) rhetoric and discourse and I really liked how he described the capitalistic nature of sexual appeal and attractiveness.

[Anonymous No.14274714]

Why is Houellebecq so frequently misinterpreted? I think maybe he enjoys more love from critics nowadays, but there are so many instances of, for example, people saying that the depictions of sex in his books are pornographic and endorsing misogyny and so on and so on, when to me at least, it couldn't be more obvious that Houellebecq is a romantic who is dismayed and is criticising the state that love and sex have been reduced to? I feel like he has so much more heart than people often give him credit for, it's bemusing to see him being accused of these things which I can't see a basis for, unless you're just being lazy and pointing out the more lewd bits without reading the books properly.

[Anonymous No.14274761]

I don't think I get him.
I've read elementary particles at it's still sitting at 2/3 on my shelf.
Some parts where engaging and emotionally really raw.
The part where the brothers sit in the living room, one of them telling his woes, the other one distancing himself was great.
But then the book bores you to death again with uninteresting stuff.

[Anonymous No.14274818]

I'm about half way through pic related. I'll probably finish it, but I'm not all that hyped about it.
It's a bit too dry and detached/cynical at times. It doesn't give me as many feels as I thought it would.
It would probably impact me more if I was younger and not as "redpilled" about relationships and people.

But I can see why many people like it, especially the way he explores certain topics in raw form without too much political correctness. It's a book you probably couldn't release in the present day Anglosphere.

[Anonymous No.14275046]

>>14274761
I don't know lad, I personally couldn't put it down and finished it in 3 days.

Never read anything that gets how I feel about the modern world to this level. It's really quite something.

[Anonymous No.14275050]

Read Submission and Atomised.

What now?

[Anonymous No.14275100]

Read Serotonin and Whatever will read Atomised soon. Enjoyed both, part of me doesn't want to read Submission, too big a blackpill to swallow I feel.

Feel like critics spend too much time focusing on what are essentially small things in his stories, like the CP description in Serotonin and "Yuzu's canine adventures".

[Anonymous No.14275107]

>>14275100
I think Submission might surprise you, basically all of the press about it was ridiculous and should be ignored. It's one of my favourites, I think, and I've read almost all of his books. It's not the 'Muslim 1984' or whatever idiot journalists want you to think, it's much better. I also agree that the reactions to those things you mentioned in Serotonin were completely overreacted to by a lot of people it seems. Serotonin is one of his much less outrageous books, anyway.

[Anonymous No.14275125]

>>14275107
Think it's more a critique of French upper classes who are willing to surrender their culture for the sake of material rewards, such as 15 year old wives. These people are much removed from the realities of the middle and lower classes, and are incredibly selfish.

[Anonymous No.14275154]

>>14275125
Yes, this is right. I don't know how on earth so many people (deliberately, maybe?) fail to understand this. I suppose the whole cultural TV serial that is the media's pimping out of terrorist attacks is just too juicy for these morons to put aside. It seems like suck-up liberals like to pat themselves on the back for denouncing Houellebecq as islamophobic or misogynist or one of those other things, and the mentally challenged cashed-up idiot conservatives like to pat themselves on the back for completely missing the point of the entire novel and continuing to participating in the exact culture, or maybe just one of the cultures, that Houellebecq is taking the piss out of.

[Anonymous No.14275217]

I read "Whatever", and I think it captured the zeitgeist of the 2010s before they even began.
He's a great writer.

[Anonymous No.14275291]

>>14272854
I told a French friend of mine I'm not sure I'm smart enough to get Houellebecq. He said most French people aren't either.

[Anonymous No.14275299]

>>14272532
Finished reading extension du domaine de la lutte a few days ago. Now I want to kill myself. Send help.

[Anonymous No.14275334]

Serotonin, Submission, Map and Territory, and Elementary Particles. The guy is a one hit wonder, but he is immensely readable. Every book is le middle aged <insert occupation here> who is bored of sex and also the west is falling apart

[Anonymous No.14275343]

>>14274714
He's obviously a reactionary catholic writer. I remember reading an article on tablet which summarised it perfectly. Only the most profound sentimentalists would write disgusting scenes like him. They're a criticism of love in the modern world.

https://www.thetablet.co.uk/features/2/16907/michel-houellebecq-an-unlikely-catholic-thinker

[Anonymous No.14275566]

>>14272784
Honestly think I got less out of reading HOuellebecq in french than english lol

[Anonymous No.14275575]

>>14275343
brainlet

[Anonymous No.14275606]

>>14275343
>criticises all religions

surely a catholic

[Anonymous No.14275832]

>>14275100

>Feel like critics spend too much time focusing on what are essentially small things in his stories, like the CP description in Serotonin and "Yuzu's canine adventures"

I couldn't agree more. The reviews largely seem to ignore how melancholic and sincere the novel actually is in favour of the repugnant backdrop. No mention of Florent's veneration of love, no sympathy for the man who has lost his chance at happiness, nothing. And what about the end where, Houllebecq is perhaps at his bleakest, theorizing how the whole of western high culture would be reduced to groveling in front of "a wet pussy", how, for men, there never was and never will be anything higher than that.

[Anonymous No.14276082]

>>14275832
If he didnt want critics to focus on those moment, he shouldn't have included them for shock value. Less so the dog thing, but the paedophile scene is drawn out purely for shock and adds nothing to the story. It appeals to edgelords and makes reading the rest of the book a sour experience

[Anonymous No.14276138]

>>14272553
IDK. I couldn't relate to the character much (thankfully), so I didn't find it nearly as depressing. Good read, but not the most well-written work. Definitely would read his other books.

[Anonymous No.14276270]

>>14275343
>>14275606
I'm not either of these people but I can relate to both.
Probably because the lapsed Catholic or someone raised without religion but where Catholicism is the spiritual outlet is a different atheist than how we normally define the term. Houellebecq encounters all of the existential problems of the Catholic but without Christ or God as the stand-in. Houellebecq is aware of the Catholic God and what supposedly comes forth from him, he understands the calamity if you take this out of the equation. There's a mysticism and spiritual longing in Houellebecq.
Houellebecq understands a world without God is a world of empty matter and meaninglessness.

The atheists in the spotlight today are incapable of this. They define "God" (ironically) as fundamentalists do. God is a magic wizard that grants wishes and lives in a skycastle who made the world 4,000 years ago. The atheists simply turn against this God. From him, no meaning or purpose or importance comes forth. The world of toys, to the New Atheist, is sufficient (Evangelicals have a slightly dumber, more nihilistic philosophy/ cosmology/ theology, but not by much). It's why Richard Dawkins gets tangled up with people who think the devil hides dinosaur bones, while Catholics and Jews kind of snicker at that whole mess.

Houellebecq reminds me a lot if Burke, if Burke truly could hold a grudge against tradition while espousing the importance of it. Its why the character in Soumission bumbles around Paris as the city clamours for any stand-in to true Godlessness and sleeps in monasteries, desperately trying to connect with the monks and longs for artistic thinkers 100 years old.

If a New Atheist had written Soumission, the main character would be some schlub that constantly tries to get out of work, eats junk food all day and lives in that disgusting, horrific bliss of weed, Rick and Morty, and videogames. Soumission was written in a world in which love is missed.

[Anonymous No.14276327]

>>14276082
Houellebecq is not for clucking little moralists who try to dictate the terms of engagement. Think bigger or read somebody else.

[Anonymous No.14276586]

>>14276327
edge

[Anonymous No.14277113]

>>14273884
>where the dying old man from the satanist cult is trying to grope the little girl before he dies, then her seeing his vertebrae in the pyre after he's cremated
You mean the DAD of the guy who latter becomes a satanist cult leader, right?

[Anonymous No.14277147]

>>14272532
isn't that the vocalist of Eyehategod?

[Anonymous No.14277248]

>>14276270

It would be more correct to say Houellebecq is a lapsed communist (he was one when young) and since communism is a lay version of Catholicism...

[Anonymous No.14277740]

I think he is one of the only greats alive.
More like him?

[Anonymous No.14277768]

>>14277740
Fernando Pessoa, Otto Weininger

[Anonymous No.14277776]

>>14275343
>>14277248
>>14276270
In his last interview he says he goes to (catholic) church every sunday. He likes catholicism, but finds it hard to be devoted enough.
He admits jokingly that once he comes out of church, his devotion disappears.

[Anonymous No.14278298]

>>14277768
What the fuck has Pessoa to do with Houellebecq?

[Anonymous No.14278350]

>>14278298
A lot I would say

[Anonymous No.14278361]

>>14278350
Like what? Tell me I'm really curious.

[Anonymous No.14278364]

>>14275050
The Map and the Territory

[Anonymous No.14278381]

Submission. It was funny as hell. I've been wanting to read the Elementary Particles for the longest time but haven't gotten round to it.

[Anonymous No.14279414]

>>14275832
>The reviews largely seem to ignore how melancholic and sincere the novel actually is in favour of the repugnant backdrop.

Yes, reading the reviews on Goodreads and watching a few on YouTube makes me feel like I'm losing my mind because they all miss the point of the sex scenes. Essentially every sex scene minus two in The Elementary Particles is meant to be repugnant. But all of the reviews harp on the "gratuitous" descriptions of sex. These people think every description of sex is meant to titillate.

[Anonymous No.14279724]

Just finished Submission. I'm probably the exact sort of person Houellebecq's satire is aimed at. But in all honesty, I'd convert to Islam if it gained me similar benefits as Francois. A life of purpose, with a well defined honor code, rather than the make-your-own-meaning system that currently exists. The return to patriarchy and a cute teenage wife wouldn't hurt either.

[Anonymous No.14279754]

>>14279724
But converting to Islam would mean severing the bond you have with your ancestral culture. Are you ready to sacrifice what people shed their blood for in the past in order to get a cute wife? Can you imagine looking your ancestor who fought at Poitiers in the eye, telling him that you converted to Islam willingly?

[Anonymous No.14279770]

>>14273364
4.
His ideas are 10s. Trying to finished Atomised but its filled with rants that are more like short essays than literature. Ill continue it tonight though.

[Anonymous No.14279804]

>>14279754
A valid argument, but only if the assumption that I was of European descent was correct. If I was, I'd probably try to return to traditional Catholicism. The story doesn't unfold that way in Submission though, and in real life as well, I don't see a mass revival of Christianity happening anytime soon. Islam however, has the zeal that a religion needs to survive and reproduce in today's world.

[Anonymous No.14279882]

>>14275125
>>14275154
i think it's more about how the world will eventually realize that a lack of religion is basically cultural suicide and will submit to whatever gives them some sort of ontological core, in this case Islam

[Anonymous No.14280730]

>>14277248
>since communism is a lay version of Catholicism
explain

[Anonymous No.14280839]

>>14272795
Based

[Anonymous No.14280852]

>>14272553
>Ah yes, extension du domaine de la lutte

[Anonymous No.14281194]

>>14276138
I am nearly in his situation that's why

[Anonymous No.14281235]

>>14272532
Elementary Particles. Was enjoyable and read it quick, but have a feeling all his books will be the same, meaning rants against his mom, women, the modern world etc

[Anonymous No.14281311]

>>14281235
oh yeah his mother tried to sue him over Particules Elementaires because he exposed her as a whore