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Houellebecq's clarity of style is often remarked upon and the translation does a mostly decent job of conveying, in short chapters, in a fairly staccato book, his distaste for modern life. The narrator of the novel is young (just 30), well paid (computers!) and without a love life--not a geek, nor particularly a social inadequate, rather someone who just doesn't connect. He writes strange, allegorical animal stories; is a clumsy philosophical dilettante; and finds himself bored, overly self-aware and analytical, unable to settle and settle for his life. Then he is told to go on a extended work trip training provincial civil servants in the use of a new computer system accompanied by the extremely ugly Raphael Tisserand. Throughout the novel, the cheapening of sex and intimate relationships through commodification and modern communication technology is contemplated, but the interrogation remains relatively uncommitted; the attacks on psychoanalysis come thick and fast, seem more personal and often find their target.
Houellebecq does do a good job here of exemplifying the cul-de-sac that bored intelligence often finds itself languishing in. The trouble with this as a stratagem for a novel is that the reader is in danger of caring as little for the book as the characters do for their lives; this tightrope is better walked by writers such as Beckett or even Brett Easton Ellis and navigated more successfully by Houellebecq himself in his next novel. Indeed in many ways Whatever seems like a dress rehearsal for Atomised with similar characters imbued with the same concerns, the same post nouvelle-philosophes ennui running throughout. But it is a dress rehearsal worth attending: there is more than enough clever writing here, with its mordant articulation of a very particular kind of modern unhappiness, to consider it a success. --Mark Thwaite
From Publishers Weekly
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc.
Friday evening I was invited to a party at a colleague from work's house. Read the first page
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Front Cover | Copyright | Excerpt | Back Cover
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2 of 2 people found the following review helpful
4.0 out of 5 stars
The Modern Individual,
By
This review is from: Whatever (Paperback)
"L'Extension du Domaine de la Lutte" or, as it is known in English translation, "Whatever", is a strange novel dealing with the increasing alienation of its anti-hero. This person, bored and demotivated by his work and the state of his private life, becomes increasingly detached from and contemptuous of his fellow human beings. Society in general seems less increasingly absurd to him, yet much more burdensome and irritating - the individual's way of life is becoming much less "individual", defined and shaped by as it is by forces which both expect and demand types of behaviour. Houellebecq tries to examine the nature of the individual in contemporary society and points to the paradox that increased ease of communication through technological advances has not resulted in closer relationships between people, rather the reverse. Fulfilment and happiness are not an automatic by-product of the computer age. Furthermore, economic liberalism and sexual liberalism have marched hand in hand, but both produce winners and losers (and not necessarily the same groups in each case). I thought that "L'Extension du Domaine de la Lutte" was a challenging novel, unsettling at times even though there are some lighter touches (such as the perils of buying a single bed when you're single). The anti-hero is an unsympathetic figure, intentionally so, and his acerbic views can exasperate, but the novel does make you think about the nature of "progress" and how the modern world might be reshaping the lives of individuals. G Rodgers
3.0 out of 5 stars
Disgusted,
By
This review is from: Whatever (Paperback)
The main character in this book shouts a cynical diatribe against sexual and economical liberalism, wherein men and women are painted as disgusting, decrepit adolescents. They are only searching for more sex, power and influence in the marketplace or taking the necessary measures to assure their dominating position therein. The main targets of his insults are psychiatrists, dentists, bureaucrats and modern women.This book is not without some severe contradictions; e.g. while insulting psychiatrists, the main character seeks himself psychological counselling(!); while treating women contemptuously, he looks for real love. This book reads like a train. It gives us a real good portrait of the actual working conditions of middle management in a big modern company. Even with its controdictions, this work is a worth-while read.
3.0 out of 5 stars
Disgusted,
By
This review is from: Whatever (Paperback)
The main character in this book gives us a cynical diatribe against sexual and economical liberalism, wherein men and women are painted as disgusting, decrepit adolescents. They are only searching for more sex, power and influence in the marketplace or taking the necessary measures to assure their dominating position therein. The main targets of his insults are psychiatrists, dentists, bureaucrats and women, although at the end he seeks himself psychological counselling!This book reads like a train. The French title 'Extension du domaine de lutte' suggests that the author intended to portrait a rebel in our modern capitalist society. But his main character becomes disillusioned and leaves the rat race for a peaceful retreat in the countryside! This book gives us a good portrait of the actual working conditions of middle management in a big modern company. A worth-while read.
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