An American who has walked away with France’s top book awards for his first literary work ‘Les Bienveillantes’ written in French. Wouldn’t you think this would be making major headlines in the US? It’s not just the fact that he’s written a brilliant book but if you take a look at his interview (Conversations with his editor Richard Millet La Revue-Le Debat excerpted by Florent Georgesco for Le Figaro 29 Dec).
Littell’s life to date sounds pretty much like the seeds for a novel. Born in New York City, arrived in France at age 3, returning to the US for his teenage years, he meets Borroughs in Colorado and writes his first science fiction novel - but doesn’t consider himself a writer as much as a translator of novels at that point in his life. Aside from his science fiction novel, written in his early twenties, there’s little hint of the novel that lingers, ripens and matures like a vintage wine. It had been on his mind since 1989.
I wondered how a 38 year old born in 1967 could choose as his primary character a Nazi officer at the death camps - that is until I read this interview. Littel l- after taking the route of college and then some time off in Eastern Europe - found himself in Bosnia, Sarajevo, to be precise, in 1993, working with an NGO - kind of. He describes himself as being a freelance aid worker.
He also doesn’t find it difficult to put himself in the shoes of a Nazi officer - ‘if I had been born in 1913 in Germany instead of 1967 in the USA.’ He doesn’t look for excuses for behavior - following the Greek model - it really doesn’t matter whether a person was aware or unaware of his actions - what’s done is done and justice is served according to the crime. Needless to say, Littell having lived in war-torn areas has accumulated the kinds of experiences that can bring light on different points in history where the same atrocities repeat themselves. Just as war underlines man’s worst and best qualities,a book such as Littell’s can be the unerring mirror of the parts of our humanity we might prefer to leave unexamined.
If you’re wondering why you haven’t read more about Littell, it may well be that his take on the American scene in recent years (politically speaking) is uncompromising. Just as this book took many years of simmering before getting to the page, it may be a few years before it gets across the ocean. (2008 is the projected date for an English translation) (In all fairness, Littell’s feat did stir up some media attention - but moreso in relation to the Frankfurt book fair
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I read Littell’s book over the winter break and found it absolutely fascinating, but also dark, depressing and ugly. It raises many questions about how and why people behave as they do in war. It addresses the similarities between the nazi regime and the soviet communist regime. It’s a great story - with many peculiar and usually hideous twists. Much, much more could be (and has been, mostly in french) written about this book. It’s too bad the book won’t come out in english for a year. I’m convinced that Littell will get the same level of attention in the US when it does emerge - this is a masterpeice and will ignite a renewed interest in WWII and the nazis, the holocaust, etc.
Thanks David for your comment. Yes, dark, depressing and ugly was coming through to me loud and clear in the first pages that I have read, but I will persist when I in the springtime until I get to the end of this tome. Having read the excerpts from the Littel interview and understanding that he did relief work in Bosnia really helped in understanding where the author was coming from on this subject.
Have to ask you this, now, have you read Houellebeck (sorry about spelling) and if so, how do these two authors compare in your opinion?
That was Michel Houellebecq.
Parisgirl - I started on Les particules élémentaires in french last year I think, but lost interest before 100 pages, to tell you the truth. Not sure why, maybe I didn’t try hard enough. Just a personal reaction, of course. By the way, I bought a book (The Company) by Littell’s father - a spy novel, with elements on the history of the CIA! From the reviews, it looks good, but I haven’t started it yet.
Yes, I had exactly the same experience reading les particules elementaires. The Company sounds like much more fun.
It sounds like you might be interested in a book called ‘The Outlaw Sea’ (sorry I don’t have the author’s name at my fingertips). (there’s nothing about Paris in this book) but very interesting for anyone who’s doing sea travel of any sort.
What if I told you that this book is a montage, based on a plagiarism? I have proof.
Love,
Chas
Please refer yourselves to:
Beevor, Anthony
The Battle Of Stalingrad
The Fall Of Berlin
Friedrich, Otto
The Kingdom Of Auchwit
Kufus, Thomas and Eder, Harriet
Mein Krieg — documentary 1990
cheers,
ps
want more?
Charles: Thanks for reminding me that Les Bienveillantes is still sitting on my ‘to finish reading’ table. I’m assuming you’ve read the book cover to cover, as well as the impressive list of books you’ve noted here. Chapeau! I remember seeing a French mini-series on television quite a few years ago, then a year later seeing the movie True Lies with exactly the same plot - later, I learned that apparently some French movie plots are sold to American companies for development. It was very strange seeing the same film twice with different actors and slight changes in the plot. I guess you’ve had this kind of deja vu experience also.
I was given Les Bienveillantes by an exhausted French friend who said she simply could not finish it–having spent her childhood in Normandy during WWII, she is not prone to want to revisit those days in literature, and told me I was welcome to it.
Since Dec. 27, I have not been able to put it down, and am up to Stalingrad. The book is rivetting, but deeply disturbing: I keep sensing a true human being trying to break to the surface in Aue, but his humanity can only manifest itself in his tormented sexual relationships and in his equally tortured state of digestion.
I myself am not French or even a French teacher, but welcome every opportunity to stretch my linguistic boundaries–in this case, way beyond them, since significant moments in the text are NOT to be elucidated by my trusty Cassell’s Dictionary!
I am also keenly interested in the “Good Germans” like Adam Von Trott, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Hans and Sophie Scholl, and even military types like Henning Von Treskow, who served in Russia, as did the heroic Stauffenberg. So it is even more depressing to have to slog through all this horror without a soul to admire–young Voss (who has just been killed somewhere around p.300) seems to be the Voice of Reason and Sanity in the novel–so of course Max does not agree with him, and of course Voss has to be shot down in some Caucasian family burst of honor.
Littell has done something far more than titillate with grand guignol horror here, and I hope his book gets the attention it deserves from serious readers on both sides the Atlantic.
Bravo, bravo for having the courage and perserverence to read Les Bienveillantes. I am duly shamed now into trying to take another stab at it - I have to confess my reading time has been GREATLY compromised by blogging - to the extent that the library has become a quiet place for me to be writing posts rather than reading. Resolution is for 2008 is to get the reading/writing balance back into better harmony.
RE: your comment about ‘good Germans’ Tell me, what ever happened to the film ‘The Good German’ which was supposed to be released in 2006/2007. It came and went and I never even caught a review. Was I sleeping - did it flop? Was it ignored?
Parisgirl–
(are you actually IN Paris? Quelle chance!)
The name of the film rings a faint bell, but I am not much of a movie goer. There IS a film about to be released about Stauffenberg, the man who came closest to killing the monster in 1944 (alluded to in Les B). I shudder to think what Tom Cruise and Hollywood will have done to the subject.
A most instructive book on the “good Germans” from an outsider’s pt. of view is BERLIN DIARIES: 1940–1945, by Marie Vassiltchikov (still in paperback, an astonishing 20 years after it came out). She was a Russian princess with no $$ and lots of guts and style and class, who worked as a sec’t'y translator in the Foreign Office in Berlin. Her boss and many of her closest friends were executed for their roles in die Conspiration.
She seems to have heard something of the news from the Eastern Front, but not anything like enough to know of the horrors Les B narrates. But she was no friend of National Socialism, and thought Hitler as great a monster as Stalin.
Steven Sonderbergh’s production (2006) was the one I missed with George Clooney. No wonder I missed it - it got only limited distribution you can see the synopsis and reviews - which are a mixed bag. You see George Clooney more often in Nesspresso commercials in Paris - but he’s one of the best actors around… these days … -
http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/good_german/#synopsis
Mr. Maytals–I did not notice your comment about plagiarism before. Since I have reached p. 700-something, I have been alarmed for Littell. You mention a number of books I have not read, but one which I have, and read repeatedly, is not on your list.
Surely research for such a vast work is legitimate, though I did find myself wondering why he had not included a bibliography. Do French authors follow that protocol?
What concerns me is the lifting of particular details and even phrasing from an eye-witness report–it would be so sad if so much talent and effort were to be soiled by accusations of impropriety. If I sound Pollyanna-ish to you, that is perhaps because I am a high school teacher, and because Littell is well within the age range of many of my students (one of whom is Jeffrey Eugenides, MIDDLESEX, THE VIRGIN SUICIDES), and because every year, I find myself facing a weeping kid who has been caught in the act. Weeping boys I find particularly hard to take.
Well considering that this is a work of fiction, one doesn’t normally list a bibliography (he’s American BTW, not French) - but I certainly understand Mr. Maytals point. Especially after just finishing reading SS General by a Danish recruit in the German army who was obviously present at the Battle of Stalingrad - (by the way, the only reason I started reading this book is because it had been dumped in the trash bin because of its title - it’s a shame that Bantam hadn’t come up with a better title in 1972) for this first-person account of the Battle of Stalingrad from somebody who saw the bloody results of such lunacy firsthand.
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