Monday, September 03, 2007

So sue me!

This is probably illegal, but I am hereby posting the pages of what is one of my all-time favorite short pieces ever composed in the whole history of writing. It's Georges Perec's "Attempt at an Inventory of the Liquid and the Solid Foodstuffs Ingurgitated by Me in the Course of the Year Nineteen Hundred and Seventy-Four," translated by John Sturrock and first published in English in Granta 52 (1995). If I was teaching a semester-long writing class in which I could use only one text apart from student writing, this is it....



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10 comments:

  1. t.s.9/03/2007 10:17 PM

    What do you like about it? What would you try to teach about it?

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  2. Brent Buckner9/03/2007 10:19 PM

    [inside joke}
    I dare my sister to read that post and not think "Subjunctive, contrary to fact."
    [/inside joke]

    ReplyDelete
  3. Jenny Davidson9/03/2007 10:32 PM

    Hmm, I knew someone would ask that! Can you tell from reading it? Speculations invited...

    ReplyDelete
  4. Lee9/04/2007 4:23 PM

    This one would be great to try on one of those blind famous-author submissions to publishers!

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  5. Lee9/05/2007 2:07 AM

    Aside from a lesson in great author photos - apparently so essential nowadays for would-be writers - if I were ever obliged actually to teach writing, this piece would be a lovely to use for organisational principles.

    Do I admire Perec? Another question entirely.

    ReplyDelete
  6. Anonymous9/05/2007 10:39 AM

    Quetsch and clafoutis are cool words?

    You like the wine list?

    I really really don't get this...

    ReplyDelete
  7. Levi Stahl9/07/2007 5:22 PM

    This piece is also collected in Species of Spaces and Other Pieces, the Perec Penguin Classic that came out in 1998, if you're looking for it and don't want to have to go searching for the old issue of Granta.

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  8. Jenny Davidson9/07/2007 5:35 PM

    Yes, indeed, that is quite true, and everyone should have a copy of Species of Spaces--but for some reason I cannot keep that book in the house, I have had at least 2 or 3 now but I always give them away! Whereas somehow I have never yet gotten around to getting rid of the row of Grantas on a shelf--also the cover of that issue has a very attractive picture of sushi, whereas the Penguin is discreet and subdued...

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  9. Anonymous1/13/2009 4:07 PM

    Finally, long after I have forgotten about it you answered my question (in the introduction to your Breeding book).

    But, no, not really...you can take a dog to a mirror, but you can't him see his reflection. I understand less than ever.

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  10. Anonymous1/14/2009 9:17 AM

    Continuing my new pathetic habit of talking to myself in public on the internet, I want to fix my previous comment.

    It should read, "You can show a dog a mirror, but you can't make him see his reflection."

    ReplyDelete

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