Submission (novel)
First edition cover
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| Author | Michel Houellebecq |
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| Original title | Soumission |
| Country | France |
| Language | French |
| Publisher | Flammarion |
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Publication date
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7 January 2015 |
| Pages | 320 |
| ISBN | 978-2-08-135480-7 |
Submission (French: Soumission) is a novel by the French writer Michel Houellebecq.[1] The French edition of the book was published on 7 January 2015 by Flammarion.[2][3]
Plot[edit]
François, a middle-aged literature professor at Paris III and specialist of Huysmans, feels he is at the end of his sentimental and sex life - composed largely of year-long liaisons with his students. It has been years since the last time he created any valuable university work. France is in the grip of political crisis - in order to stave off a Front National victory the Socialists ally with the Islamic party and a minor right wing party proposing a charming and physically imposing Islamic candidate for presidency against Marine Le Pen. In despair at the emerging political situation, and the inevitability of anti-semitism becoming a major force in French politics, Francois' young and cute girlfriend, Myriam, emigrates to Israel. His mother and father die. He fears that he is heading towards suicide and takes refuge at a monastery situated in the town of Martel's important symbolic victory over Islamic forces one thousand years earlier; it is also where his hero Huysmans became a lay member. With the backing of a complaisant socialist party and an effete UMP (formerly the main rightist party in France), the brilliant and cunning politician, Mohammed Ben Abbes, candidate of the fictional Muslim Fraternity, wins the 2022 presidential election and becomes France's President. He pacifies France, enacts sweeping changes to French laws, privatizing the French University (thereby making Francois redundant with full pension as only Muslims are now allowed to teach there), putting the equality between men and women to an end, allowing polygamy (several of Francois' intellectually inferior colleagues, having converted to Islam, get good jobs and make arranged marriages with attractive young wives), and enlarges the European Union with the aim of making it a new Roman Empire, with France at its lead. In this new, different society, with the support of the powerful politician, Robert Rediger, the novel ends with François poised to convert to Islam and the prospect of a second, better life, with a prestigious job and wives chosen for him. The novel mixes fiction with reality: François Hollande, Marine Le Pen, François Bayrou and Jean-François Copé, among others, fleetingly appear as characters in the book.[4]
Themes[edit]
Houellebecq commented about the novel in an interview with The Paris Review:
| “ | … I can't say that the book is a provocation — if that means saying things I consider fundamentally untrue just to get on people's nerves. I condense an evolution that is, in my opinion, realistic.[1] | ” |
Publication[edit]
On 5 January 2015, French president François Hollande announced in an interview for France Inter radio that "he would read the book, because it’s sparking a debate".[5]
The author appeared in a caricature on the front page of the satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo on 7 January 2015, the day when the offices of the newspaper were attacked by masked gunmen who killed eight Charlie Hebdo employees. The title on the cover was: "Les prédictions du mage Houellebecq : en 2015, je perds mes dents, en 2022, je fais ramadan." (English: "The predictions of the sorcerer Houellebecq: In 2015, I lose my teeth. In 2022, I observe Ramadan.")[6]
On the day of the publishing of the book and hours before the attack on Charlie Hebdo, Houellebecq said in an interview for France Inter radio:
| “ | There's a real disdain in this country for all the authorities... You can feel that this can't continue. Something has to change. I don't know what, but something.[7] | ” |
The German translation (Unterwerfung) by Norma Cassau and Bernd Wilczek has been published on 16 January 2015 by DuMont Buchverlag.[8] The book will be released in the United Kingdom in September 2015.[9]
Reception[edit]
After the release, the book placed at the top of bestseller list of the French division of the online retailer Amazon.[10]
Several critics, including Michel de Cessole of Valeurs Actuelles and Jérôme Dupuis of L'Express, compared the novel to Jean Raspail's 1973 novel The Camp of the Saints, a satire about the political impotence of Europe during a massive wave of immigration from India.[11][12] Grégoire Leménager of Le Nouvel Observateur downplayed the similarities to The Camp of the Saints, as Submission does not deal with ethnicity, and instead placed Houellebecq's novel within a trend of recent French novels about immigration and Islam, together with La Mémoire de Clara by Patrick Besson, Dawa by Julien Suaudeau and Les Événements by Jean Rolin, speculating that the concept of the "Great Replacement" ("Grand Remplacement"), as formulated by Renaud Camus, was becoming fashionable as a literary device.[13]
- Marine Le Pen, the leader of the far-right National Front and one of the characters in the book, stated in an interview with France Info radio:
| “ | … it's a fiction that could one day become reality.[7] | ” |
- Steven Poole, writing for The Guardian, noted that:
| “ | … Soumission is, arguably, not primarily about politics at all. The real target of Houellebecq's satire — as in his previous novels — is the predictably manipulable venality and lustfulness of the modern metropolitan man, intellectual or otherwise.[14] | ” |
- Mark Lilla, in The New York Review of Books, stated similarly that:
| “ | Europe in 2022 has to find another way to escape the present, and “Islam” just happens to be the name of the next clone.[15] | ” |
- According to The Economist magazine:
| “ | … a leading French novelist, Emmanuel Carrère, compared Soumission to George Orwell's 1984.[16] | ” |
- Adam Shatz, writing for the London Review of Books, states that:
| “ | Soumission is the work of a nihilist not a hater – the jeu d’esprit of a man without convictions.[17] | ” |
References[edit]
- ^ a b Bourmeau, Sylvain (2 January 2015). "Scare Tactics: Michel Houellebecq Defends His Controversial New Book". The Paris Review. Retrieved 8 January 2015.
- ^ Willsher, Kim (16 December 2014). "Michel Houellebecq provokes France with story of Muslim president". The Guardian. Retrieved 8 January 2015.
- ^ "Après le buzz, "Soumission" de Michel Houellebecq arrive en librairie" (in French). Libération. 7 January 2015. Retrieved 8 January 2015.
- ^ "Bayrou stupide et Copé moche : quand Houellebecq dézingue les politiques" (in French). Metro News. 6 January 2015. Retrieved 8 January 2015.
- ^ Fouquet, Helene (7 January 2015). "Was Attack Linked to Novel About France Under Islamist President?". Bloomberg. Retrieved 8 January 2015.
- ^ Kachka, Boris (8 January 2015). "What Michel Houellebecq Represented to the Charlie Hebdo Shooters". Vulture. Retrieved 8 January 2015.
- ^ a b "Paris terror attack: Controversial book launched on same day as attack". The New Zealand Herald. 8 January 2015. Retrieved 10 January 2015.
- ^ "Michel Houellebecq über "Unterwerfung": "Meine Thriller-Seite"" (in German). Westdeutsche Allgemeine Zeitung. 4 January 2015. Retrieved 8 January 2015.
- ^ Flood, Alison (8 January 2015). "Michel Houellebecq’s new novel set for September publication in English". The Guardian. Retrieved 10 January 2015.
- ^ Samuel, Henry; Marszal, Andrew (7 January 2015). "'Islamophobic' Michel Houellebecq book featured by Charlie Hebdo published today". Telegraph.co.uk. Retrieved 10 January 2015.
- ^ Cessole, Bruno de (8 January 2015). "Celui par qui le scandale arrive". Valeurs Actuelles (in French) (4076). pp. 20–21. Retrieved 26 July 2015.
- ^ Dupuis, Jérôme (7 January 2015). "Soumission de Houellebecq: Big Brother revu par Guignol". L'Express (in French). Retrieved 26 July 2015.
- ^ Leménager, Grégoire (18 December 2014). "Houellebecq, Besson, Rolin... 'le Grand Remplacement', sujet de roman?". Le Nouvel Observateur (in French). Retrieved 26 July 2015.
- ^ Poole, Steven (9 January 2015). "Soumission by Michel Houellebecq review – much more than a satire on Islamism". The Guardian. Retrieved 10 January 2015.
- ^ Slouching Towards Mecca
- ^ "Irrepressible". The Economist. 10 January 2015. Retrieved 10 January 2015.
- ^ 'Colombey-les-deux-Mosquées,'
External links[edit]
- Soumission at the Flammarion official website (French)
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