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Selvportrett (2011)

by Édouard Levé(Favorite Author)

4.35 of 5 Votes: 5

languge

English

genre

Memoir & Autobiography

publisher

Flamme Forlag

review 1: From time to time it is impossible not to take a book personally. This is one of those occasions, and I am tempted to leave it alone and dismiss it and not react directly to the content for fear of seeming unsympathetic. But I am unsympathetic. The colourless melancholy of his phrases portray life as an endless weep, trapped in a cycle not of nihilistic despair, tragedy or blistering confusion, but one of precious humourlessness, an arch-individualist writing unscripted self-pity. It is barely even curious that Leve committed suicide days after delivering his final manuscript - entitled 'Suicide' - a dramatic exit diluted by the fact that suicide is the leading cause of death among adult males under 55 in France - a unique statistic in the West. Perhaps living in France as... more an outsider has been a kind of immersion/aversion therapy, my own violent rejection of herd mentality has led me to take an unsympathetic stance towards this kind of individual. It's certainly not due to an ignorance of the absolute depths of human darkness, nor blindness to the (possible) futility of (a) human life. But the lack of fight...repulses me. In honest emotional reaction I simply disagree with so much that he says, and cannot help but read everything as a symptom and contributing factor to an unnecessarily short life and a validation of the many other who - with or without reading Leve - will undoubtedly end the same way. It's strange to read this as an interlude during a Henry Miller binge. I am sure he would have hated it, brute that he is - but with reason. Henry Miller challenges everyone in his world, and all who read him, to present the proof that they are worthy of individualism, and in violent ways. He wants the evidence that you are not only a piece of meat, a genital or a beast, and Sexus feels like the antithesis to this. Outside of France Leve may sound like a voice that represents a universal human suffering and depression, but from the inside of the most depressed country in Europe, I see it as a cultural self-absorption, heinous and bordering on dangerous. I do not own 20 pairs of blue jeans. I do not have trouble believing men who say they have never slept with a prostitute. The Durutti Column, The Doors, Portishead and (most) jazz do not please me. I don't have trouble urinating in front of other men. I do not observe in nightclubs, I dance. I do not wish I smiled less, but more. I do not visualise my own funeral as a thing of beauty. I am not afraid of doing worse by trying to do better. I cannot live without music, I could live without literature. I love dogs. I would never vote for the Green Party. I am not fascinated by 'common' people, the obese and Americans. I do not wonder where I will die. No one considers me to be obsessive. I have not taken Prozac, Lysanxia, Athymil, Lexomil, and Temesta, with success. I do drink beer. I've had one best friend since childhood. My parents did get divorced, and I lied about it to avoid pity, rather than the inverse. I feel no pain from affairs that never took place. Women have hurt me more than men. To be the object of someone's pity makes me angry. I prefer to live now than in the 1960s. I can tell what in me is innate. I'm sure I will not turn reactionary with age - I am glad I was a radical teenager. I will never wear a purple velvet suit. Often simply 'No' is sufficient reprieve from life.
review 2: I love this piece. It is innovative, original. Who else has ever written a hundred page ongoing clinical description of themselves in the form of declarative statements? I can think of only Levé! And it turns into one of those reads where you can't stop; you have to sit there and read it all at once. Otherwise, it's like you have severed yourself from a vital limb and you are left in the wake of wondering what happened, feeling like you have to start all over.Occasionally amusing, often revealing some of the darkest parts of himself, this memoir captures that essence of what it means to get a person's entire personality and character out on paper and have it turn out nonjudgmental. Levé isn't here to entertain or make a statement. His piece is here for one thing and one thing only: to capture himself in words as accurately, as poignantly, and as true to himself as possible without compromising the integrity with being too intimately present in the prose.I recommend it to anyone striving to make a living off of writing. His style really highlights the need for succinct language and what information is most important to include. I admire him greatly and look forward to reading his other piece, Suicide. less

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