An Attempt at Exhausting a Place in Paris by Georges Perec and translated from the French by Mark Lowenthal (Wakefield Press 2010)
Tentative d’épuisement d’un lieu parisien was originally published by Christian Bourgois éditeur, 1975
Oulipo-mania is an ongoing series on Oulipian works, constraints, and more.
An Attempt At Exhausting a Place in Paris is, essentially, a list. Perec set out to catalog the infraordinary, “what happens when nothing happens other than the weather, people, cars, and clouds”; or, those things that are oft ignored or unnoticed. Attempt is the result of this endeavor, which Perec carries out from various vantage points in the bustling Place Saint-Sulpice. Over a three-day period in October 1974, he infers–“A priest returning from a trip (there is an airline label hanging from his satchel)”; he sees friends and a possible doppelganger; he finds a man who shares the same idiosyncratic manner of holding his cigarettes: between his middle and ring fingers; and sees a dog that “looks like Snowy” (Tintinophiles will recognize the young reporter’s four-legged sidekick, also known as Milou).
Illustration by Badaude
What you’ll recognize in this slim book is Perec’s microscopic attention to detail that figures in A Void (reviewed here).
tens, hundreds of simultaneous actions, micro-events, each one of which necessitates postures, movements, specific expenditures of energy:
conversations between two people, conversations between three people, conversations between several people: the movement of lips, gestures, gesticulations
And his wry humor: “(high heels; bent ankles)”; “A full 96 (perhaps I have only today discovered my true calling: ticket collector for the Paris City Transit Authority)”
In his afterward, translator Mark Lowenthal mentions Perec’s aim to become an absolute writer; “Perec’s legacy lies more in the effort he made in seeing and taking note of everything.” But, as Lowenthal notes, there are limitations, specifically cultural and temporal, that make this a noble but futile endeavor.
Perec’s observations of the hustle and bustle of Place Saint-Sulpice would differ greatly from, say, those of an American. Or even a fellow Frenchman of a different generation. And time, even a mere three days, works against Perec:
What has changed here since yesterday? At first sight, it’s really the same. Is the sky perhaps cloudier? It would really be subjective to say that there are, for example, fewer people or fewer cars. There are no birds to be seen. There is a dog on the plaza. Over the hôtel Récamier (far behind it?) a crane stands out in the sky (it was there yesterday, but I don’t recall making note of it). I couldn’t say whether the people I’m seeing are the same ones as yesterday, whether the cars are the same ones as yesterday. On the other hand, if the birds (pigeons) came (and why wouldn’t they come) I’d feel sure they would be the same birds.
And later
Yesterday, there was a metro ticket on the sidewalk, right in front of my window; today there is, not exactly in the same spot, a candy wrapper (cellophane) and a piece of paper difficult to identify (a little bigger than a “Parisiennes” wrapper but a much lighter blue.
Perec also admits to another limitation: his position, literally where he is situated in the square, prevents him from seeing all. He can only take note of what is happening in his line of sight. “(Obvious limits to such an undertaking: even when my own goal is just to observe, I don’t see what takes place a few meters from me: I don’t notice, for example, that cars are parking)”
The illustrations throughout this post are by Badaude, who set out to exhaust Attempt by making an infographic complete with a key that is, as she describes, “more complicated than the words it represents.”
Illustration by Badaude
In a panel where she notes her “angoisses,” it’s clear that, despite Perec’s attention to detail, there are still unknowns:
Illustration by Badaude
On one hand, you can’t help but wonder why Perec bothered to do something that was impossible and why readers would be interested in this effort. At points, the list is exhaustive and unenlightening–do we really care which busses passed through the Place?; however, the number of pages that “nothing” fills is remarkable. While full of the mundane, Attempt does give us a sense of how much we miss when we are oblivious to the space around those things that we deem important. It offers us a glimpse of what we might see should we choose to observe the things that would go by unnoticed. Undoubtedly, this is a book for the Oulipian enthusiast (guilty) but other creative types could benefit from emulating Perec.
♦
Many thanks to Badaude for allowing me to share her infographic, which you can see in its entirety in The White Review‘s Issue 3. If you aren’t familiar with her work, check out her website, where she blogs about fashion, offers comical “how to’s,” and shares the wonders/horrors of French cookbooks from the 70s and 80s (Cuisine de Meuh!).
Badaude also introduced me to the Ouvroir de Bandes dessinée Potentielle (OuBaPo), which is one of several offshoots of the OuLiPo. I hope to explore this group in the future as I find the use of constraints in illustrations fascinating.
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