Houellebecq tells least the rise of Islam that Western spinelessness, its customary obsessions in support

The rumor swells since mid-December, at least: the new Houellebecq landmark and scandal. The first book reviews are dailleurs state dun Islamophobic novel, dune bad political fiction, of a usual display of houellebecquiennes morbid obsessions ... In short, it was necessary to read it to know.

From the perspective of fictional material, Submission is a good novel, coherent and solid. Houellebecq has taken advantage of a specialist character-narrator of Huysmans, an academic whose love life is missed (a big topos of the author) and does not sintéresse in political life, in the image of the characters in Huysmans author who has ruled out his novels the turbulent political life of his time. This restriction perspective, excellently maintained by Houellebecq, implies a partial and biased view of events taking place this year 2022: François (I do not remember that he has a family name; if this is the case, comes a Another topos houellebecquien: family-structuring leading to individualism and especially of seclusion lindividu, devoid of all social bonds) has superficial judgments on politicians for example, although they are not free of correctness, and the portrait of a lapidary François Bayrou , future prime minister of a Muslim president, animated less by own ideas by envy dexister politically.

This restriction of view is offset by conversations with other characters by François, especially Tanner, member of the ISB and Rediger, professor duniversité converted from 2013 to lislam. The first helps to understand how lislam policy could settle down in France and therefore in Europe; the second gives a clear overview of lintellectuel converted to a different way of thinking for fear of emptiness and sen by the spokesman or the thurifer (one thinks of the Stalinists and Maoists of the last century); both are opened by Houellebecq on better understanding the reasons for which player the situation could have evolved until the election of a Muslim French President Mohammed Ben Abbes, Polytechnique who studied at Jena, and its logical consequences (reports more closely with the South and the Mediterranean, "redemption" of the Sorbonne by Larabie Arabia, the institution becoming Muslim facto and its members being asked to convert, etc.).

In addition, the views offered by this character more concerned LOEUVRE Huysmans and his love life (and sex ...) and weather conditions (three or four times during the novel, the narrator notes with state accuracy the sky, anticyclonic considerations supporting, generating a humorous look great shift), that policy allows Houellebecq avoid most of the excesses and amalgams which Nont not fail to deliver him for his criticism since the release of the novel: in fact one of elegance author Expansion of the Domaine de la Lutte, his only classic novel, that to keep the vast majority of ways a calm tone, avoid the untimely excesses by simply showing no comment yet quon can meet, following the election Ben Abbes, down ten percent from its current level of delinquency in the suburbs, which would tend to demonstrate that the crime would be solved by the property of a Muslim state, crime is organically linked to religion, somewhat illusory judgment and abusive ...

In this sense, it is not as innocent Submission is placed under the sign of Huysmans, presented as an ultimate naturalists, so one of the ultimate authors tempted by descriptive lobjectivité (hence some passages that could compare to daucuns pages WikiPedia) but also advocates dune theory that the environment influences beings, fully François quillustre theory from the academic bubble dedicated to the literature it no nest lenvironnant engaged on the world and its ideological choices are less guided by own convictions by the desire to be happy, academically or sexually. But very good pages on Huysmans and his spiritual journey (the narrator goes up as his favorite author, go to retire at the Abbey of Ligurgé) also allow dannoncer the final conversion of Francis while explaining, any retained relativity, the spiritual disarray of Europe, in which empty sengouffre lislam.

If lon excludes some of houellebecquiennes obsessions, sometimes a bit tedious (the woman, the eternal enemy; cigarettes as area of ​​freedom), two or three inconsistencies (but this is not a political fiction in the proper sense, since the point view is limited and sometimes Houellebecq has no burning political steps by imagining a lack of response to certain decisions of Ben Abbes, but we will return) or abuse of judgment (crime in the suburbs, as explained, but also the exclusion absolute of women from the public sphere, which contradicts what can be observed quon in Muslim-dominated countries other than strict Sharia) Submission is a good book, good anticipation in the sense that it starts from current premises to imagine a future plausible.

But where many critics read in this novel an attack against lislam, jy rather a lis attack against the man West, lost in aesthetic considerations, self-absorbed, uprooted, both the family and the values ​​that founded its culture (hence that identity are also present in Submission), unable to face his existence and spineless; a Western man willing to swallow nimporte what ideology provided quon let him stew in his personal concerns, which is the case of the narrator, François, representative of the intellectual part of the population, that meant very little quon react throughout face Submission the decisions taken by Ben Abbes as such should be its role. Therefore, we say that Houellebecq has chosen describe anticipation lislam came to power; he could write another novel, with almost the same narrative, of liberalism, self-righteousness in all its forms, collapse programmed educational or cultural, or the diététisme lhygiénisme This without untoward amalgams. In the imaginary future threat, the reader may substitute nimporte any other threat to the Occident and its values, and the result is the same: Submission.