Post-Exoticism in Ten Lessons, Lesson Eleven

by Antoine Volodine, J. T. Mahany (Translator)

Overview

"The interconnected works of Volodine—think Faulkner, but after an apocalypse—constitute the most exciting project in contemporary French literature."—Maria Clementi

That is what we had called post-exoticism. It was a construction connected to revolutionary shamanism and literature. . . . It was an interior construction, a withdrawal, a secret welcoming land, but also something offensive that participated in the plot of certain unarmed individuals against the capitalist world and its countless ignominies. This fight was now confined solely to Bassmann's lips.

Like with Antoine Volodine's other works (Minor Angels, We Monks & Soldiers), Post-Exoticism in Ten Lessons, Lesson Eleven takes place in a corrupted future where a small group of radical writers—those who practice "post-exoticism"—have been jailed by those in power and are slowly dying off. But before Lutz Bassmann, the last post-exoticist writer, passes away, a couple journalists will try and pry out all the secrets of this powerful literary movement.

With its explanations of several key "post-exoticist" terms that appear in Volodine's other books, Lesson Eleven provides a crucial entryway into one of the most ambitious literary projects of recent times: a project exploring the revolutionary power of literature.

Antoine Volodine is the author of dozens of books under a few different pseudonyms, including Lutz Bassmann and Manuela Draeger. These novels—several of which are available in English—articulate a post-exoticist universe filled with secrets, revolutionary writers, and spiders.

J. T. Mahany is a graduate of the University of Rochester's MA in Literary Translation Studies program and is currently enrolled in the MFA program at the University of Arkansas.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781940953113
Publisher:	Open Letter
Publication date:	05/12/2015
Pages:	100
Product dimensions:	5.50(w) x 8.40(h) x 0.40(d)

About the Author

Antoine Volodine is the primary pseudonym of a French writer who has published 20 books under this name, several of which are available in English translation, including Minor Angels, Naming the Jungle, and Writers. He also publishes under the names Lutz Bassmann (We Monks and Soldiers) and Manuela Draeger (In the Time of the Blue Ball). Most of his works take place in a post-apocalyptic world where members of the "post-exoticism" writing movement have all been arrested as subversive elements. Together, these works constitute one of the most inventive, ambitious projects of contemporary writing.

J.T. Mahany is a graduate of the masters program in literary translation at the University of Rochester. He is currently translating several books by the enigmatic and intriguing French author, Antoine Volodine.

Editorial Reviews

04/20/2015
Volodine's books (Minor Angels, Naming the Jungle) aren't so much novels as bizarre games of alternate reality, chronicling the lives and works of the fictitious "Post-Exotic" writers, whose complex and challenging novels and poems have led to their being imprisoned, persecuted, or assassinated outright. This book begins with an account of the death of Lutz Bassmann, last of the Post-Exotics, then explores the origins of the movement in "revolutionary shamanism" and lays out a wonderfully baffling catalog of sub-genres that only vaguely resemble any real existing literature. Volodine introduces stalwart underground "mercenaries of speech" like the mad poet Ellen Dawkes, and provides excerpts from Post-Exotic romances, novellas, and critiques of titles like Mirrors of the Cadaver; there is also a list of invented techniques such as "narrative scansion" and the "under narrator," as well as an appendix listing all 343 known Post-Exotic works—several of which "Volodine" has actually published under a variety of pseudonyms. Taken as the sum of its parts, this book isn't much more than a curiosity, but as a primer for Volodine's fascinating career project, it's required reading. By redefining the role of writers in society and building a fantasy universe where they are both revered mystics and enemies of the state, Volodine carries literature into a realm that only the likes of Borges and Calvino could have anticipated. (May)

Publishers Weekly

"Clever and incisive."—New York Times

"All of this seems unreal and hyperreal. But this is a book signed by Antoine Volodine—and this is what we have come to expect of anything bearing his name . . Irreducible to any single literary genre, the Volodinian cosmos is skillfully crafted, fusing elements of science fiction with magical realism and political commentary. It is an unnavigable matrix whose inhuman face is pockmarked by linguistic and narrative black holes, which force the reader to critically rethink the boundaries of literature and language itself."—Nicholas Hauck, Music & Literature

"His quirky and eccentric narrative achieves quite staggering and electric effects. . . . Dazzling in its epic proportions and imaginative scope."—The Nation

"His talent surfaces time and again in luxurious, hypnotic ways."—Publishers Weekly

"Volodine's characters struggle against humankind's demise, managing to cling to their full names and little else, and in the process they reveal their compelling histories and strange presents, all of them concerned that their stories be told.'"—Tim Feeney, Review of Contemporary Fiction

From the Publisher

2015-03-31
French author Volodine aims at the head rather than the heart in this postmodern novel featuring one of his main alter egos, Lutz Bassmann, supposedly the author of his most renowned book, Minor Angels. From the title alone we know we're not in a Jamesian tradition of realistic fiction. Volodine is far more interested in crafting an aesthetic than a novel with plot and character conflict. The opening conceit here is that sometime in the future, the incarcerated Bassmann is facing death for unknown reasons (though primarily because he's seen as a revolutionary), yet he remains to the end a spokesman for the "post-exotic principle according to which a portion of shadow always subsists in the moment of explanation or confession, modifying the confession to the point of rendering it unusable to the enemy." This 11th "lesson" of post-exoticism—the main narrative thread—is interrupted by 10 other lessons made up of lists and aesthetic manifestos of various pseudo-authors/alter egos such as Maria Clementi, Elli Kronauer, and Bassmann. These names are all masks for Volodine himself, whose authorial voice remains enigmatic in the extreme. The manifestos primarily define and examine a world of post-exotic forms, the most important of which are romånces, Shaggås, and interjoists. A random sampling of Volodine's (and Bassmann's) preoccupations would include the following: "A Shaggå always breaks down into two distinct textual masses: one part, a series of seven sequences rigorously identical in length and tone; the other, a commentary, in which the style and dimensions are free." To be sure we get the point, the tenth (and final) "lesson" of the novel consists of a list of 343 works identified by title, author, form, and date, a whimsical and tortuous exhibition of post-exoticism itself. Elaborate fiction that has a certain perverse fascination—though one wonders subversively whether it needs doing at all.

Kirkus Reviews