reading_now_in_french epitome of incomprehensibility Reading_now...... in French! Une vie inutile by Simon Paquet. As of January, I'm trying to read one French book a month. Reading is no substitute for speaking, but it helps me learn new words. My plan became more than a duty when I came across Mégot mégot petit mitaine by Johanne Alice Côté – her language is absolutely beautiful. I also tried to get into a Marie-Claire Blais book, Les nuits de l’Underground, but it's too difficult for now. Une vie inutile (A Useless Life) seems, so far, a comedy-mystery in the vein of Paul Neilan’s Apathy and Other Small Victories – with less suspected human-hamster sex and more references to Voltaire. One of my friends recommended the poet Mallarmé. Has anyone here read him, either in French or in translation? Just curious. 130417 ... e_o_i (The title of the blathe was inspired by a fortune cookie experience a few years ago. People were adding "in_bed" to every fortune, and I got "You will read a good book... in bed." Grrr.) 130417 ... e_o_i I finished Une vie inutile. "Une vie inutile est une mort anticipée" said Goethe (but wouldn't he say it in German?) Maybe the truck driver that kept following the narrator WAS trying to kill him? ...But otherwise the book isn't a mystery, as I assumed from the first few pages. And unlike Apathy and Other Small Victories, the humour relies on exaggerated versions of mundane problems - bad things keep happening to the poor narrator - rather than sheer weirdness. I'll try to explain. True life incident: a couple of years ago, I felt miserable and decided to take a walk. Deciding I was lonely, I thought I'd feel better if I just had a small animal to cuddle... and found myself face-to-face with a skunk on a neighbour's lawn. That's all. Just ordinary irony. I backed away and nothing happened. BUT if I were in the world of the book, I would've been sprayed by the skunk, gone home in stinking misery, and found two messages on my answering machine - one from the high school friend who'd been ignoring me, another from the token Love Interest (an Austrian exchange student studying philosophy - every story needs one of 'em) both asking me if I'd like to hang out. Yes, I'm glad I don't live in the world of that book. But I quite liked it, even though the ending makes no sense. 130518 what's it to you? who go blather from