Scope and Contents This biography of Georges Perec (1936-1982), novelist, poet, verbal gamesman, and master puzzler, whom Italo Calvino called, 'so singular a literary personality that he bears absolutely no resemblance to anyone else,' is very lucidly presented. The biographer, David Bellos, also the English translator of Perec's books, has written such an interesting book that it almost reads like a fictional account of Perec's life. It is extremely well researched and documented. Examples of Perec's typewriter art, which he did mostly while working as a technician in a Neurophysiology Laboratory in Paris are printed on pages 260 and 690. Alexander Laurence wrote the following book review printed on the Internet 1999.We're all familiar with the term "slacker" and characteristics of the twenty-nothings who populate Douglas Coupland's novel Generation X. These are all attempts to capture a vibrant youth culture that adds to the present time. But what if I were to tell you that the French writer,...

Scope and Contents

This novel contains two distinct alternating biographies: the first is an allegorical story of W, a bizarre, mythical island civilization, symbolizing the Holocaust. It is printed in italics. The second text is Perec's memories of his childhood in Paris. Perec writes in his introduction that the two stories "are in fact inextricably bound up with each other, as though neither could exist on its own, as though it was only their coming together, the distant light they cast on each other, that could make apparent what is never quite said in one,never quite said in the other, but said only in their fragile overlapping." -- Source of annotation: Marvin or Ruth Sackner.