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Life: A User's Manual

Georges Perec,

David Bellos (Translator)

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Sep 26, 2021 Pamela rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: tonkin-best-100-translation, boxall-1001-read, guardian-1000-read

Life: A User’s Manual is based in a single Paris apartment block. I say based, because as Perec tours the apartments in the block (not forgetting to examine the cellars, stairs and lift) his imagination takes him around the world and on ever more bizarre adventures with the owners of the flats.

For example, we meet a trapeze artist who becomes more and more reluctant to come down from his trapeze, a cyclist who flees to South America after a terrible accident and becomes involved in organised cr ...more

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Sep 26, 2012 Lauren rated it really liked it

I was walking around a big used booksale about 12 years back, with a friend and a box of books. He picked up a copy of Life, a User's Manual and said that I needed to read it, so I plopped it into my box.

Later, asking him why I needed to read this book, he said something along the lines of Georges Perec is awesome. He wrote a different book in which he never used the letter "e". Now, this is not the kind of thing that makes me want to read a book. This sounds like a lame writing assignment in 9t I was walking around a big used booksale about 12 years back, with a friend and a box of books. He picked up a copy of Life, a User's Manual and said that I needed to read it, so I plopped it into my box.

Later, asking him why I needed to read this book, he said something along the lines of Georges Perec is awesome. He wrote a different book in which he never used the letter "e". Now, this is not the kind of thing that makes me want to read a book. This sounds like a lame writing assignment in 9th grade. I added the book to my bookcase and there it sat.

So, a bit sheepishly, I'm here to report that this was an enjoyable read. It centers around a slightly gimmicky construct: what is going on at a precise moment of time in each of the 99 rooms in an apartment block. Wikipedia says, "It was written according to a complex plan of writing constraints, and is primarily constructed from several elements, each adding a layer of complexity." Whatever. I tried not to think about this and just enjoy the story.

It is worth noting that the people who live in this apartment complex are way more interesting and obsessive than anyone I've ever met. Off the top of my head, they include
1) A guy who wrote a 1000+ page history of opera openings that nobody ever wanted to publish
2) Some rich dude who went on an obsessive quest for the Vase of Joseph.
3) A wealthy couple who get turned on by watching each other steal things.
4) A trapeze artist who one day refused to climb down

A familiar theme is that somebody finds a really old something in a dusty basement which turns out to be an obscure thing that would amuse Umberto Eco.

Doesn't this sound fun? I must admit that there are some less fun parts. Perec describes seemingly every wall hanging in the building, and every last item sitting on every last table. I read these sections fast, but they still made me want to go shopping.

I'm going to mark the following as spoilers, but I don't think reading it will really spoil anything. But I went into the read knowing absolutely nothing about the plot, and I want you to have that option too.

(view spoiler) ...more

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