[GeroMeroHero]

Since this book generated so much interest on Returnofkings and in the Manosphere in general (notably from Quintus Curtius, Troy Francis, and of course Heartiste). As such I think a thread to aggregate reviews for discussion of it is a good idea.


Two reviews I found. One a fairly generic Spiked.com review that understood the target of the book is not Islam but the weakness of French democracy
http://www.spiked-online.com/review_of_b...M2-QfldWO4
A decent review but Troy Francis' Returnofkings review hits the same beats and is better.
http://www.returnofkings.com/53588/why-m...el-of-2015
*Note: Troy Francis clears up the English translation's arrival as Summer of this year.

A more political review (as will be obvious) comes from a dissident-right site called Vdare. You will note the Amren/Jared Taylor ads. Disclosing that in case it bothers people. Also a very good article.
One thing Vdare points out that has been missed is that Houellebecq truly excoriates the 1960's student movements, and rightfully so (my own words there).
But without giving more away:
http://www.vdare.com/articles/houellebec...eem-europe

I felt important to share these to get ideas germinating early, but also early enough to not prematurely color perceptions as such thoughts will be distant when the English version hits the shelves.

What jumps out about the novel, and is apparent a staple in Houellebecq is the main character is quite empty. Purposeless, finding solace in sex.
Some would derisively say this is simply the author inserting himself as nothing more than to put down the book, but the obvious significance of this character is a representation of modern life. Which is the real focus of the story, the political situation is just a topical outlet.

[komatiite]

Is there an English translation yet?

[Porfirio Rubirosa]

(02-03-2015 11:39 AM)komatiite Wrote:  

Is there an English translation yet?

No, the English-language translation will not come out until late-summer.

[Patriarch]

Really looking forward to this book after hearing some of our guys talk about it. Are this guy's other books all good reads, or is there a definite "must-read" for the new initiate?

[komatiite]

(02-03-2015 10:48 PM)Porfirio Rubirosa Wrote:  

(02-03-2015 11:39 AM)komatiite Wrote:  

Is there an English translation yet?

No, the English-language translation will not come out until late-summer.

Dang, my crappy high school Canadian french will be no match for a book like this, i hope I remember to get it once it comes out!

[Hedonistic Traveler]

(02-04-2015 08:04 AM)Sweet Pea Wrote:  

Really looking forward to this book after hearing some of our guys talk about it. Are this guy's other books all good reads, or is there a definite "must-read" for the new initiate?

I liked his first book a lot, "Whatever". I thought "Elementary Particles" and "Platform" were both pretty weak though.

There is actually a long thread on "Whatever" here on the forum. Lots of good insight. The book focuses on the loss of intimacy in modern culture and the widening gap between the elite (whether financially or sexually) and the average.

I felt like the two other books were mainly just rehashing old ideas and were borderline erotic-fantasy at times. Hopefully "Soumission" gets into some new stuff. Unfortunately I can't read French, so I'll be waiting until this Summer.

[philosophical_recovery]

I got ahold of a French book an am reading it now.

SPOILERS BELOW


Classic houellebecq, he starts talking about his failed sexual relations with women near the beginning with very red pill views. I'm only in the second chapter and am taking it slow because I have to consult a dictionary for the words I don't recognize, but he talks about the wall and cougardom.

Quote:

Des que j'arrivai dans le restaurant basque ou j'avais invite Aurelie a diner, je compris que j'allais passer une soiree sinistre. Malgre les deux bouteille d'Irouleguy blanc que je fus a peu pres le seul a boirem j'eporuvai des difficultes croissantes, qui devinrent vite insurmontable, a maintenir un niveau raisonnable de communication chaleureuse...

Quant au presentm il etait evident qu'Aurelie n'avait nullement reussi a s'engager dans une relation conjugalem, que les aventures occasionnelles lui causaient un degout croissant, que sa vie sentimentale en resume s'acheminait vers un desastre irremediable et complet. Elle avait essaye ourtantm, au moins une fois, jhe le compris a different indices, et ne s'etait pas remise de cet echec, l'amertume et l'aigreur avec lesquelles elle evoquait ses collegues masculins [parenthetical statement about her job with lots of international travel] revelaient avec une cruelle evidence qu'elle avait pas mal morfle.

So, paraphrasing because my french isn't the best, he met up with an old flame after she spent lots of time in her job. He can tell that the conversation is going to be a bad one. She hopped arounf, but never managed to land a guy for marriage. She recounted stories of her male colleagues with the such bitterness and acidity that he could tell it had taken a great emotional toll on her. I'm not going to type out the rest, but he speaks of how bad her body looks now, and that she hadn't just paid emotionally.

He speaks of another woman, and the discovery of cougadom. One in particular, he says

Quote:

Dans un an ou deux elle aurait laisse de cote toute ambition matrimoniale, sa sensualite non parfaitement eteinte la pousserait a rechercher la comnpagnie de jeune gens, elle deviendrait ce qu'on appelait dans ma jeunesse une cougar, et cela durerait sans doute quelque annees, une dizaine dans le meilleur des cas, avant que l'affaissement cette fois redhibitoire de ses chairs ne la conduise a une solitude definitive.

Basically, after a year or two more after seeing her he expects her to lose all instinct to become a mother, but because she still has desires she is pushed to hunt for young men before, in the best of cases, a decade later, the weakness of her flesh cripples her to a definitive solitude.


I haven't gotten to the meat of the novel yet, obviously, but this is a bit more direct about the red pill reality than his other novels I have read, like "Plateforme", where the protagonist was a total sexless loser who went to Thailand. I know Roissy read him, but I wonder if Houellebecq reads the manosphere. It wouldn't surprise me a bit.

He's a pretty easy read, and clearly red pill.

[xxxronjames]

(04-14-2015 11:41 PM)philosophical_recovery Wrote:  

He's a pretty easy read, and clearly red pill.

Yep, probably one of the easiest authors to read in French.

[Lucky]

I got the English translation a couple days ago and I'm halfway through. Anyone else reading?

The book is pithy and insightful-- typical Houllebecq.

[Rutting Elephant]

Great book. I extracted a few of my highlights (no spoilers) which might whet someone's appetite to read it:

Women

Quote:

[college girl speaking:] "Let’s say you’re right about patriarchy, that it’s the only viable solution. Where does that leave me? I’m studying, I think of myself as an individual person, endowed with the same capacity for reflection and decision-making as a man. Do you really think I’m disposable?” The right answer was probably yes, but I kept my mouth shut.

My life would have been truly tedious and dreary if I hadn’t, every now and then, fucked Myriam.

Even my very comfortable pension wouldn’t be enough to see me through a serious illness. On the other hand, it did allow me to sign up for more escorts. I felt no real desire, only an obscure Kantian notion of “duty toward the self,” as I surfed my usual sites. In the end I settled on an ad posted by two girls: a twenty-two-year-old Moroccan named Rachida and a twenty-four-year-old Spaniard named Luisa promised “the enchantments of a wild and mischievous duo.”

Hidden all day in impenetrable black burkas, rich Saudi women transformed themselves by night into birds of paradise with their corsets, their see-through bras, their G-strings with multicolored lace and rhinestones. They were exactly the opposite of Western women, who spent their days dressed up and looking sexy to maintain their social status, then collapsed in exhaustion once they got home, abandoning all hope of seduction in favor of clothes that were loose and shapeless.

she’d collapse, get into a sweatshirt and yoga pants, and that’s how she’d greet her lord and master, and some part of him must have known—had to have known—that he was fucked, and some part of her must have known that she was fucked, and that things wouldn’t get better over the years. The children would get bigger, the demands at work would increase, as if automatically, not to mention the sagging of the flesh.

To visualize a woman’s thighs and to mentally reconstruct her pussy where the thighs intersect—a process whose power of excitation is directly proportional to the length of bare leg—was so involuntary and mechanical with me, so genetic you might say, that it took me a while to notice what was missing: no more dresses or skirts. Women were wearing a new garment, a kind of long cotton smock, ending at mid-thigh, which eliminated any objective interest in the tight pants that some women might potentially wear; as for shorts, these were obviously out of the question. The contemplation of women’s asses, that small, dreamy consolation, had also become impossible.

Culture

Quote:

When people got tired of that candidate, and the center-left in general, we’d witness the phenomenon of democratic change, and the voters would install a candidate of the center-right, also for one or two terms, depending on his personal appeal. Western nations took a strange pride in this system, though it amounted to little more than a power-sharing deal between two rival gangs, and they would even go to war to impose it on nations that failed to share their enthusiasm.

I’ve always loved election night. I’d go so far as to say it’s my favorite TV show, after the World Cup finals.

Microwave dinners were reliably bland, but their colorful, happy packaging represented real progress compared with the heavy tribulations of Huysmans’s heroes. There was no malice in them, and one’s sense of participating in a collective experience, disappointing but egalitarian, smoothed the way to a partial acceptance.

I’d had no trouble giving up all of my professional and intellectual responsibilities, it was actually a relief, and I had no desire whatsoever to be that businessman sitting on the other side of our Pro Première compartment, whose face grew more and more ashen the longer he talked on the phone, and who was obviously in some kind of deep shit.

Epigrams

Quote:

the affectionate, slightly mocking look that women get when they witness a conversation between men—that oddity, not quite buggery, or duel, but something in between.

he was one of those people, and you don’t see them every day, who take an instinctive pleasure in the happiness of their fellow men—he was, in other words, a nice guy.

that phrase the balance of power always sounds impressive in conversation, as if you’d been reading Clausewitz and Sun Tzu.

For men, love is nothing more than gratitude for the gift of pleasure.

I started to wonder what I was doing there. This very basic question can occur to anyone, anywhere, at any moment in his life, but there’s no denying that the solitary traveler is especially vulnerable.

In the end, my dick was all I had.

[Eskhander]

Steve Sailer reviewing the book. Found this thread simply by searching. I figure this is where it should go.

http://takimag.com/article/submission_st...z3pviHshYS