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Georges Perec

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Author

The Resume

    (March 7, 1936-March 3, 1982)
    Born in Paris, France
    Birth name was George Peretz
    Member of OuLiPo (Workshop of Potential Literature)
    Wrote 'Things: A Study of the Sixties' (1965), 'Which Moped with Chrome-Plated Handlebars at the Back of the Yard?' (1966), 'A Man Asleep' (1967), 'La Disparition' (1969; translated as 'A Void'), 'W, or the Memory of Childhood' (1975), and 'Life: A User's Manual' (1978)

Why he might be annoying:

    He was unable to support himself as a writer until after publication of Life: A User's Manual.'
    He was a heavy smoker, which contributed to the lung cancer that killed him.
    His 'constrained writing' experiments (such as a 399-line poem in which each line is an anagram of the title) can seem gimmicky.
    'La Dispirition,' a 300+ page novel that never uses the letter 'e,' tends to be a bitch to translate while maintaining its central conceit.

Why he might not be annoying:

    He was adopted by his paternal uncle and aunt after his father died from shrapnel wounds during World War II and his mother died in a concentration camp.
    He was a natural lefty who was forced in school to learn to write right-handed.
    He created crossword puzzles for the political magazine 'Le Point.'
    The New Yorker wrote, 'Whoever decides to read him will come away not only with a new sense of what is possible in literature, but of how strange and exciting, and how fun, real originality can be.'

Credit: C. Fishel


Featured in the following Annoying Collections:

Year In Review:

    In 2023, Out of 1 Votes: 100% Annoying
    In 2022, Out of 4 Votes: 75.00% Annoying