Michel Houellebecq





Michel Houellebecq

Author profile


born
in France
February 26, 1958

gender
male

website

genre

influences


About this author

Michel Houellebecq (born Michel Thomas), born 26 February 1958 (birth certificate) or 1956 on the French island of Réunion, is a controversial and award-winning French novelist. To admirers he is a writer in the tradition of literary provocation that reaches back to the Marquis de Sade and Baudelaire; to detractors he is a peddler of sleaze and shock. Having written poetry and a biography of the horror writer H. P. Lovecraft, he brought out his first novel Extension du domaine de la lutte in 1994. Les particules élémentaires followed in 1998 and Plateform , in 2001. After a disastrous publicity tour for this book, which led to his being taken to court for inciting racial hatred, he went to Ireland to write.

Michel Houellebecq won France's to...more


Average rating: 3.72 · 26,392 ratings · 2,044 reviews · 34 distinct works · Similar authors
The Elementary Particles
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3.74 of 5 stars 3.74 avg rating — 9,178 ratings — published 1998 — 77 editions
Platform
3.74 of 5 stars 3.74 avg rating — 5,057 ratings — published 2001 — 45 editions
The Possibility of an Island
3.74 of 5 stars 3.74 avg rating — 3,695 ratings — published 2005 — 49 editions
La Carte et le Territoire
3.87 of 5 stars 3.87 avg rating — 3,281 ratings — published 2010 — 51 editions
Whatever
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3.55 of 5 stars 3.55 avg rating — 2,647 ratings — published 1994 — 53 editions
H.P. Lovecraft: Against the...
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3.95 of 5 stars 3.95 avg rating — 874 ratings — published 1991 — 18 editions
Lanzarote
3.21 of 5 stars 3.21 avg rating — 834 ratings — published 2000 — 12 editions
Public Enemies: Dueling Wri...
by
3.29 of 5 stars 3.29 avg rating — 245 ratings — published 2008 — 13 editions
Michel Houellebecq Coffret ...
3.85 of 5 stars 3.85 avg rating — 88 ratings — published 2001
Rester vivant: et autres te...
3.82 of 5 stars 3.82 avg rating — 73 ratings — published 1999 — 3 editions
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“The absence of the will to live is, alas, not sufficient to make one want to die.”
Michel Houellebecq

“Those who love life do not read. Nor do they go to the movies, actually. No matter what might be said, access to the artistic universe is more or less entirely the preserve of those who are a little fed up with the world.”
Michel Houellebecq, H.P. Lovecraft: Against the World, Against Life

“People often say that the English are very cold fish, very reserved, that they have a way of looking at things – even tragedy – with a sense of irony. There’s some truth in it; it’s pretty stupid of them, though. Humor won’t save you; it doesn’t really do anything at all. You can look at life ironically for years, maybe decades; there are people who seem to go through most of their lives seeing the funny side, but in the end, life always breaks your heart. Doesn’t matter how brave you are, how reserved, or how much you’ve developed a sense of humor, you still end up with your heart broken. That’s when you stop laughing. In the end there’s just the cold, the silence and the loneliness. In the end, there’s only death.”
Michel Houellebecq, The Elementary Particles

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