Dear Log,
Well, we found the real-life Krusty the Klown....
«[Houellebecq's] hangdog look in the dock may have been due in part to reading depressing British reviews of Platform, which recounts Michel's adventures of selling sex holidays in Thailand.The Guardian said it did not add up. The Sunday Times wrote it off as "pretentious, banal, badly written and boring" and the Times said that Mr Houellebecq, who French critics like to bracket with Albert Camus, was no more a novelist of ideas than Benny Hill.»
Quoting from the Gardian article
Hey, Lévi-Strauss (this genius) is not dead yet, AFAIK ! And comparing an anthropologist that worked on the process of evolution of myths and primitive religions with a short-sighted racist makes no sense. Houellebecq is just another poor writer, un pauvre crétin. He got some hype after the publication of his first books, due to some well-orchestrated media campaign; now he deserves this trial : somebody had to point out how untalented and stupid he really is.A petition being handed round by Sollers, the most assiduous self-publiciser among contemporary novelists, drew on the collective wisdom of an impressive legion of dead writers, beginning with Blaise Pascal and running through Montaigne, Voltaire and Lévi-Strauss, who have shocked by expressing outspoken views on religion.
Re:Houellebecq's books suck
boru on 2002-09-18T10:12:53
I've read 'Plateforme' and 'Les particules élémentaires' (AKA 'Atomized'). Both are excellent especially the former and both were well-received by the critics in France. The fact that the author stated that Islam was the stupidest of religions or that sex tourism was a good thing have nothing to do with the quality of his work. I don't agree with him on those two points but I still think he's a very good writer. (BTW, I'm not French.)
