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the complete review - fiction

The Flight of Icarus

by
Raymond Queneau

general information | review summaries | our review | links | about the author

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Our Assessment:

A- : a slight but clever literary game, very entertaining

See our review for fuller assessment.

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The complete review's Review:

       Queneau has come up with a charming premise for his novel, set in Paris in the fin de siècle 1890's. The French author Hubert has begun writing a novel, only to have his main character -- Icarus -- disappear. Not just metaphorically, but physically. And so off Hubert goes, in search of his character. Pirandellian one of the characters calls his dilemma, as it indeed it is. And Queneau has Pirandellian fun with it.
       Told in the form of a drama, in 74 short chapters (or scenes), the misadventures of Icarus, an unformed innocent, and Hubert, who keeps searching for Icarus in all the wrong places are recounted. There's a great deal of clever literary play here, commentary on both the Aesthetes of the late 1800's and modern fiction, and Queneau has any number of literary tricks up his sleeve. It's all exceptionally well done, with many a twist to it, and a great deal of fun. Barbara Wright's translation also manages to capture the playfulness of the original very well.
       It is a slight book -- an entertainment -- but it is also a very good one. Strongly recommended.

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Links:

• Oneworld Classics publicity page
• Einaudi publicity page

• booklit
• fareLetteratura (Italian)
• Damian Kelleher

• Scriptorium page
• Raymond Queneau at books and writers
• Fonds Queneau - useful Queneau site, French and English
• Interview from Review of Contemporary Fiction
• Reading Raymond Queneau by Barbara Wright, in Context
• Caricature by David Levine

• Children of Clay
• Exercises in Style
• The Last Days
• We Always Treat Women Too Well
• Zazie in the Metro

• See Index of Oulipo books under review
• See Index of French literature at the complete review

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About the Author:

       French author Raymond Queneau (1903-1976) is one of the most influential figures in modern French literature. He was General Secretary of the publisher Gallimard, and one of the founders of the Oulipo.

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