Suicide (French Literature) (French Literature Series) - Softcover

Edouard Leve; Jan Steyn (translator)

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1564786285 ISBN 13: 9781564786289

Publisher: Dalkey Archive Press, 2011

Synopsis

Edouard Levé delivered the manuscript for his final book, Suicide, just a few days before he took his own life. Suicide cannot be read as simply another novel it is, in a sense, the author s own oblique, public suicide note, a unique meditation on this most extreme of refusals. Presenting itself as an investigation into the suicide of a close friend perhaps real, perhaps fictional more than twenty years earlier, Levé gives us, little by little, a striking portrait of a man, with all his talents and flaws, who chose to reject his life, and all the people who loved him, in favor of oblivion. Gradually, through Levé s casually obsessive, pointillist, beautiful ruminations, we come to know a stoic, sensible, thoughtful man who bears more than a slight psychological resemblance to Levé himself. But Suicide is more than just a compendium of memories of an old friend; it is a near-exhaustive catalog of the ramifications and effects of the act of suicide, and a unique and melancholy farewell to life.

About this title

Review:

Suicide is not a fictionalized account of Levé s death; in some respects it is a negative image of it. You didn t leave any letters for loved ones to explain your death, he writes, although Levé himself reportedly did. Levé s art and life nonetheless converge, fuse, and end brutally together. Ironically, Suicide represents a new departure for Levé: his previous books could be considered conceptual conceits, whereas Suicide is something else, a purely literary work. At the end of his life, Levé had by no means exhausted his art. --Hugo Wilcken - The Berlin Review of Books

"an astonishing novel.." --Zadie Smith, Harper's Magazine

"an astonishing novel.." --Zadie Smith, Harper's Magazine

Suicide shows another side of the French artist's interest in transfixing phenomena. Since suicide normally takes place behind a curtain of privacy even more exclusionary than the one reserved for sex, its ability to drum up interest is assured. --Christopher Byrd, Guardian

About the Author:

Edouard Levé was born on January 1, 1965 in Neuilly-sur-Seine. A writer, photographer, and visual artist, Levé was the author of four books of writing Oeuvres, Journal, Autoportrait, and Suicide and three books of photographs. Suicide, published in 2008, was his final book. Jan Steyn is a South African translator from French and Afrikaans to English. He lives in Paris where he does work in Cultural Translation at the American University of Paris.

About this edition

• Publisher: Dalkey Archive Press
• Publication date: 2011
• ISBN 10: 1564786285
• ISBN 13: 9781564786289
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 144