Georges Perec - Les Revenentes (Juillard, 1997 - originally 1972) ***½

We already loved "La Disparition" (translated in English as "A Void"), Perec's novel in which something has mysteriously disappeared, perplexing the characters and making them look for this 'present absence'. The book is written without the vowel "e", which leads to weird sentences at time, considering how omnipresent the letter "e" is in French. 

With "Les Revenentes" he does the exact opposite, writing a novel in which the only vowel is an "e", which makes it almost impossible to translate into any other language, but even the French original remains a feat of concentrated creativity. Sure, he tweaks the rules a little bit - for instance the "u" can be dropped when used after a "q" - but that does not diminish the effort it must have taken. 

The story itself is a wonderful romp of Berber rebels, criminals, the selling of stolen gems, and perverted clerics who all end up in a great orgy which would be considered pornographic by all standards except maybe in this situation of exaggerated story-telling. 

Perec loved language, as he again testifies here. There is fun in every word, in every turn of phrase, there is pleasure in the effort itself. And even if it's showing off his skills, that is not the main thing. It's all about the joy of language, including the weird twists of sentences and probably of the story too that comes with the possibly toughest stylistic restriction that an author can impose upon himself. 

It leads to sentences such as this one, which made me laugh out loud: 

"Cependent, le chef des rebelles berbères, Mehmet ben Berek, enlève Thérèse Merelbeke et l'emmène en jeep dens le bled. René, désesperé, redescend prestement et presse Leclerc de rechercher les rebelles. Mets le chef reste ferme et prétend que Thérèse est décédée!".

or some more: 

"Bérengère de Bremen-Brévent (B de BB, elle est célèbre, tel BB) entreprend de vendre ses perles et se sert de l'entregent de l'Evêqe d'Exeter, Serge Merelbeke, leqel, en être pervers et dégénéré, ne rêve qe sexe, de fesses et dérèglements". 

... and this for 138 pages long, and as you can notice, some words are a little changed, but overall the effort is quite strong. Perec is as a consequence also possibly the only author who wrote two novels with not one word in common.  

The book has also been translated into English as "The Exeter Text: Jewels, Secrets, Sex" in the compilation "Three" from 2004.

In the total oeuvre of Perec, the real masterpiece to look for is "La Vie: Mode d'Emploi", which goes beyond his obsession with language, style and form into a bigger picture narrative of a more realistic nature, even if most the characters have their own obsessions.