Nurit Buchweitz - 20 Feb

Nurit Buchweitz

AN OFFICER OF CIVILIZATION

The Poetics of Michel Houellebecq

Bern Berlin Bruxelles Frankfurt am Main New York Oxford Wien

Bibliographic information published by die Deutsche Nationalbibliothek Die Deutsche Nationalbibliothek lists this publication in the Deutsche Nationalbibliografie; detailed bibliographic data is available on the Internet at http://dnb.d-nb.de.

British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data: A catalogue record for this bookis available from The British Library, Great Britain

Library of Congress Control Number: 2015931744

Cover Image: Roee Rosen, The Second Funeral of Roee Rosen, Seen From His Own Viewpoint After Being Buried, With the Ground Transparent, 2008 (Detail), Oil on Canvas, Two circles, 150 cm diameter each, Courtesy of the artist and Rosenfeld Gallery.

ISBN 978-3-0343-1581-4 br. ISBN 978-3-0351-0766-1 eBook

This publication has been peer reviewed.

Peter Lang AG, International Academic Publishers, Bern 2015
Hochfeldstrasse 32, CH-3012 Bern, Switzerland
info@peterlang.com, www.peterlang.com
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To my parents Rosemarie and Abraham Koren

Contents

Must

I

Really

Be

An officer

Of the imagination

[]

Will I finally sit down in my pajamas in front of the fridge

Drinking sweet coffee and chewing on an avocado sandwich

After a working day that put order into a world

Of disorder, that stopped the currents before they washed-off

The city, the man and the houses, I wonder

Who would have done it but me

Imagining to myself how bad

The state of affairs would be without me

And what a comprehensive and multi-responsible operation

Is involved in the maintenance of civilization

Meir Wiezeltier, I Ask Myself, in idem, The Concise Sixties (Tel Aviv: Hakibbutz Hameuchad, 1984) [Hebrew]. My translation. ix | x
x | xi

The impetus, and ambition, to write this book arose from my fascination with Michel Houellebecqs powerful, intense, and unfeigned writing. I was particularly attracted to Houellebecqs fierce discourse and his overt engagement with reality.

I embarked upon this journey out of curiosity and it was indeed a thought-provoking experience. I soon began to discern that, in my opinion, Houellebecq shares many of the traits that drew me to the works of the Israeli poet laureate Meir Wiezeltier, which were the focus of my PhD dissertation and first book. In particular, both writers exercise a robust and compelling poetics. I do not attempt to compare between Houellebecq and Wiezeltier, nor do I suggest the existence of any intertextual relations between the two; suffice it to say that from my humble perspective, similarities appear evident. However, the title of this book is a citation from Wiezeltier, a phrase which I believe perfectly describes Houellebecqs position on reality.

In writing this manuscript I have benefited from the insights and assistance of family, friends, and colleagues.

I wish to extend my thanks to Prof. Ziva Shamir, who guided me when I first plunged into Wiezeltiers world, in hindsight facilitating me with the necessary tools to find my own way in Houellebecqs writings.

I am also grateful to my colleagues at Beit Berl College Israel, Prof. Amos Hoffman, Prof. Izhak Greenberg, and Prof. Tamar Ariav, for their encouragement, generosity and patience.

I owe a debt of gratitude to those who at have read all or parts of the manuscript and offered their valuable advice. Conversations with Dr. Cynthia Biron-Cohen, Dr. Gilad Padva, Dr. Einal Baram-Eshel, and Dr. Hana Livant helped me to sharpen my ideas and approach.

I would like to thank the many students who have participated in my seminars on Houellebecq, especially Adi Zidon, Rachel Arbel, and Lilach Borovsky, who helped me read Houellebecq and inspired me to keep an open mind. xi | xii

I am sincerely indebted to Dr. Rebecca Wolpe for her indispensible work in refining the shape of my book in matters of language and style. So many thanks to the devoted French editor Marlne Shemouni.

I am very grateful to the artist Prof. Roee Rosen for granting me permission to reproduce his image on the cover of my book. I chose the image out of deep appreciation of his art, and due to my contention that Roee Rosen shares Michel Houellebecqs conceptual environment and artistic style.

Finally, I would like to thank my husband Igal for his fervent moral support and my children, Erez and Yael, for their genuine inspiration. xii | xiii

xiii | xiv
xiv | 1

Let us begin with a warm up: Michel Houellebecqs most recent novel, The Map and the Territory (La carte et le territoire, published in 2010), tells the story of the protagonists (Jed Martin) broken boiler. Most of the story unfolds in the prologue, with the incident of Jeds broken heating system serving as a frame for the other events that are woven into it the Christmas dinner that Jed is planning with his father and his completion of two paintings: Damien Hirst and Jeff Koons Dividing Up the Art Market and The Architect Jean-Pierre Martin Leaving the Management of his Business. References to the boiler which uttered a succession of loud banging noises. It went rigid, paralyzed. It was already 15 December. (Map, p. 4) [le chauffe-eau mit une succession de claquements secs. Il se figea, ttanis. On tait dj le 15 dcembre. (Carte, p. 11)] are scattered throughout the prologue. Each section opens or concludes, sometimes both, almost verbatim: one ends with a description of the boilers collapse in the previous year One year before, on almost the same date, his boiler had uttered the same succession of banging noises before stopping completely. (Map, p. 4) [Un an auparavant, peu prs la meme date, son chauffe-eau avait misla mme succession de claquements, avant de sarrter tout fait. (Carte, p. 12)] and the next begins, one year on, the boiler repair had held, and this was the first time that it had shown signs of weakness. (Map, p. 9) [Un an plus tard, la rparation avait tenu, ctait la premire fois que le chauffe-eau donnait un signe de faiblesse. (Carte, p. 20)]. In between appear further references to the boiler which form a recurring refrain: It was the noise of the boiler that had woken him, but not the usual banging noises; the machine now gave out a prolonged, low-pitched, almost infrasonic roar. (Map, p. 12) [Cest le bruit du chauffe-eau qui lavait rveill, mais ce ntaient pas les claquements habituels, la machine mettait cette fois un ronronnement prolong, grave, presque infra sonique. (Carte, p. 27)]. These mentions of the boiler at key points in the text serve to capture the readers attention. 1 | 2 and Jeds father are key actors in the short episode that unfolds. The chill in Jeds apartment becomes unbearable following the breakdown of the boiler, preventing him from completing his fathers portrait before the Christmas dinner at which he had intended to unveil it. Jed invests a great deal of effort in repairing the boiler, and by December 24 it is once again in working order. The temperature rises slowly as Christmas Eve approaches. On December 15 of the following year the heater once again breaks down. This time too, the protagonist has difficulty enduring the cold; however, on this occasion the heat becomes truly unbearable The room was hot, suffocatingly so (