Une étrange lumière : Michel Houellebecq ou La vision du poisson

2007 ◽  
pp. 333-344
Keyword(s):  
Gragoatá ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 25 ◽  
pp. 455-472
Author(s):  
Angela Maria Dias

O presente ensaio busca apresentar, numa perspectiva comparatista e atualizadora, duas diferentes leituras de temas cruciais ao século XIX, como o dandismo e o decadentismo. Nesse sentido, aproxima, respectivamente, O retrato de Dorian Gray (1890), de Oscar Wilde, e Submissão (2015), de Michel Houellebecq, do romance emblemático À rebours (1884) de Joris-Karl Huysmans. Tanto a obra de Wilde, quanto a de Houellebecq, de maneiras distintas, interpretam tais questões em chaves inusitadas. O primeiro desloca seu refinamento, pelo apetite da crueldade melodramática ao explorar a margem monstruosa de sua época. O segundo desvia-se da melancolia desencantada do seu clima crepuscular, numa deriva satírica e cínica, por reconhecer a convergência entre o decadentismo novecentista e a nossa atualidade distópica e aviltada pelo avanço da desterritorialização do humano.


2018 ◽  
Vol 55 (3) ◽  
Author(s):  
Catherine Du Toit

Since Wild Dog first crawled from the Wet Wild Woods and laid his head on Woman’s lap, he has helped man, not only to hunt and protect, but also as guide. A guide with enhanced senses in the physical world who could find a way across unmarked landscapes, a clever empathic being who could lead man to certain places or to specific individuals. No wonder then that the best-known ancient dog deities accompany humans as guides, often on their way to the afterlife. Dog guides—not to be confused with guide dogs—have remained a constant feature of the representation of dogs in literature, reflecting as much of the nature of these dogs as of the nature and needs of the humans they attend. In this way, the human-animal relationship also reveals how the solipsistic tendencies of human self-definition limits our capacity for being in the world. In the two contemporary novels that form the basis of my enquiry, La Possibilité d’une île (2005) by Michel Houellebecq and Op ’n dag, ’n hond (2016) by John Miles, the agency of dog guides introduces an intriguing element of distancing, reminding us that the self has meaning only in relation to another and that human concerns are not absolute.


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