Customer Reviews

The Power of Flies

5 star:		(7)
4 star:		(16)
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2 star:		(9)
1 star:		(4)

 

 

If you want a book to entertain you, then you'd best look elsewhere. This is an often rambling soliquoy by a former museum guide who is on trial. He talks about his parents, his wife, his discovery of Blaise Pascal, the visitors to the museum, etc. The only dialogue is what the narrator chooses to tell. As he tells his tales you slowly gain more insight into the man and his life. He's not a nice person, and his life is not, to say the least, enviable.

This is a man who has been shaped by a domineering, bullying father who cares much more about Stalin than his wife and son. The man grows up and gets married, but the marriage certainly is not an enjoyable one. Basically, the man is without close friends, and there is nobody he really likes, including his wife. But then he discovers Pascal, and the dead writer becomes his only friend. It's bleak and depressing: Pascal is his only joy, and his emotions are mostly based on anger--overt or covert--and the anger slowly increases. Even if you didn't know at the start of the novel that he's on trial for murder, you'd feel that the outcome was going to be bad.

This is not a book that's going to explain everything carefully for you and wrap up the story in a neatly-packaged box. Kafka's The Trial and Wilde's De Profundis have a similar feel. But you get insight into the dark soul of a man.

Since this is about the 25th review to appear for this book, I doubt there is little I have to add. But I'm writing a few words here because, as a Vine Voice, I am required to. And because I really disliked the book and think others who know my reviews might want to know that. I could barely get through the book largely because I found the style artily confusing, the narrative uninteresting, and because I found the narrator/protagonist both infuriating and pathetic. But then I didn't finish 'Swann's Way', either, so that may tell you something. (It's also possible that after retiring from more than thirty-five years practicing psychiatry, I didn't find this description of a man's insanity all that interesting.)

Come to think of it, I haven't liked the last three French novels I've read, so maybe I have some sort of anathema for French literary style.

Scott Morrison

"The power of flies, they win battles, hinder our soul from acting,
consume our body."

The narrator of The Power of Flies, a man accused of murder, discusses his history with the [French] judge, the man in charge of the prison infirmary, and the appointed psychiatrist. Told entirely in the first-person present, the narrator talks of his unsatisfying job as a museum guide, of his unsatisfying marriage, and of his unsatisfying and intolerable father who abused his late saint of a mother - of whom he also speaks in the present tense.

He, despite the emotional and physical abuse of his father, has overcome, he will tell you, and has, indeed, become superior to those he meets. This is in no large part due to his vast knowledge and his insatiable love of reading. He is especially partial to the 17th century mathematician, philosopher Pascal. (Indeed, he sees his mother in Pascal, and Pascal in his mother.) Perhaps the most unsatisfying part of his wretched job is showing the horrid tourists its original Pascal acquisitions, for the tourists do not appreciate the writings, the nail-studded belt to which he returns.

Is the narrator a boor, or is he truly superior? Is he truly superior, or is he mad? Are flies merely flies, or are they metaphors for hatred, for sloth, for all that the narrator sees in himself? Are the unanswered questions really questions, or are they of no importance whatsoever?

"The Power of Flies" was translated from the original French by Jane Kuntz. It retains its feeling of a non-American novel, a genre which some prefer to the Western work of fiction. While this is not my favorite type of book, I can honestly say that I had difficulty putting it down and that, when I did put it down, I rushed back to it.

I'm a bit late to the party with my review of this book, so I see no reason to go over the various plot points or the rather unique approach that French author Lydie Salvayre took with this book. I found "The Power of Flies" interesting and quite readable, although the protagonist was very difficult to empathize with or to really care about. His recollections of his childhood living in fear of his abusive father and victimized mother are harrowing and give the reader an understanding of why this man is so consumed with hatred that he is unable to love anyone except maybe the spirit of philosopher Blaise Pascal. Still it is hard to read his telling of how cold and cruel he is to his own wife and with the people he works with. The title refers to the power of hatred, which consumes the soul of this wretched man. As he recounts the story of his life, it is unclear for much of the book exactly what he is on trial for, as there is no remorse for his crime in his monologue. Later, it becomes evident that he is on trial for murder, but the reader (or at least I was) is unsure of who he killed since he passionately hates his boss at the museum, his wife, his co-workers, and, of course, his father. This is obviously not light, easy reading, but it is an interesting character study and moves along at a good pace. It is quite short and concise, as novels go, so it never quite reaches the point where you just can't wait to get out of this guy's head. I found myself thinking about the many people we encounter in life who often blend into the woodwork or who sometimes seem a bit odd. How many of them are like this man? That's frightening!

I chose to read this book because of its purported connection to the thoughts, indeed The Pensees, of Pascal. I'm interested in Pascal and was curious as to how his ideas would be engaged by this novel. Sad to say, Pascal doesn't show up in The Power of Flies. Not the real Pascal, at any rate.

The narrator -- a deeply unhappy man who doesn't understand that he is deeply unhappy, or why -- believes he understands Pascal, but he does not. Which fits into the dramatic strategy -- ultimately, he is not an insightful man, or at least is not insightful in the way he thinks he is, and therefore his use/misuse of Pascal is entirely "in character." Fair enough. So the lack of Pascal is sad (for me) but isn't the reason I found the book only so-so.

Other reviewers have noted this novel's thematic and stylistic similarity to the existentialist French novels of the 20th century. From the few Camus and Sartre works I've read, I'd agree -- the echoes are there.

And that's my problem with the book. I admire the discipline of the prose, and I bought into its "monologic" approach, at least more than other reviewers, it seems. I'm just not certain The Power of Flies brings much to the party that wasn't already brought to it decades ago. I understand that we delude ourselves, yes. I understand there is at times a fine line between apparent madness and existential dread. And I understand that the self is ultimately the one thing we cannot wrestle free from and ultimately the one thing we sometimes most long to lose.

Is it me, or is this material kind of tired by now?

The Power of Flies is not a waste of time. It is a well-crafted book. But it reminds me of viewing a contemporary painting that is obviously building on or referencing some older painting in which some important problems were worked out and addressed. The newer painting might be more technically able and more smoothly wrought, but the older work did all the heavy lifting -- and sometimes the struggle that accompanied that heavy lifting was what made the original a classic.

As finely made as The Power of Flies is, it's also facile. Kundera once said the the sole responsibility of the novel is to discover that which only the novel can discover. The discoveries in this book were made a long time ago and, without the benefit of novelty, they now seem slight and somewhat sorry things.

"Should the reading of The Power of Flies be considered a form of entertainment, Monsieur Jean?"

That's a modified quote from the book (actually, of the whole ninth chapter), but I think it works perfectly to describe how I feel about it. The Power of Flies, a book by French author Lydie Salvayre, is a very particular piece of writing, to say the least. In it, a museum guide stands trial for murder and while said trial takes place he tells a complete story of his life to four different audiences: the judge, the jailer, his lawyer and the court psychiatrist

But what makes this book unique is that all of his conversations are one-sided. We never get to read what any of the other characters have to say, making this an intense soliloquy filled with ramblings and thoughts of a very peculiar individual, obsessed with his mother, his father, his work as a guide (and how good he looks in his grey uniform), but especially with French philosopher Blaise Pascal

However, what makes this book great is also what gives it its problems. At first it is very entertaining to read what this madman has to say (and he has a lot to say!), but after a while it can become tiresome and sort of redundant. This is not to say that the book falters completely, but that as a gimmick it gets old pretty quick. Fortunately, Salvayre has a way with words and keeps matters interesting with lots of dark-ish humor and wit

The Power of Flies (La puissance des mouches) is a short, quick paced, and well-written book, and even though it has more ups and downs than I would have liked, it's still an interesting and refreshing read

I hesitate to recommend it highly, but I will say that you'd probably like it if you read it...

In most murder mysteries, the question is who did it, and only then, why. The Power of Flies reverses this. We know from the outset who did "it." Within the first few pages, we learn that the narrator is a criminal defendant addressing the judge (and perhaps jury), a doctor, and someone who appears to be a prison administrator. What we don't know is what he did, who he did it to, or why.

The narrator worked as a tour guide, devoted to the somewhat obscure philosopher and mathematician Blaise Pascal. (The story is given greater depth if the reader has some familiarity with Pascal, but it is in no way necessary.) As the narrative unfolds, details of his childhood, dysfunctional family, and troubled marriage all come slowly to the surface. Trickling out in a series of digressions, roundabout confessions, and self-justifications.

In the process, we slowly come to understand the narrator. However, he is most emphatically not someone to be liked--sympathized with, perhaps, but certainly not liked. And he would have it no other way.

Or would he? Is isolation actually a cry for help--and justification for his isolation in prison? Or is his isolation from humanity the reason for his actions. The brilliance of Salvayre is that each reader must come to his/her own conclusion.

Of course, Notes From Underground is the classic book of a loner dealing with his isolation through rage and arrogance. And in the existentialist vs. pomo 20th century there are many examples of the isolated loner as a character archetype from The Catcher in the Rye to God Laughs When You Die. Of course, the most obvious one would have to be Taxi Driver (Two-Disc Collector's Edition) but this book does a pretty good job of imitating the Dostoyevski classic.

Our narrator is a Blaise Pascal enthusiast who is on trial for murder. As he tells his story, two narratives take place. ONe is a story of an unhappy abusive marriage - his parents - and the other concerns his increasing isolation as he falls more and more under the sway of Blaise Pascal and tears himself away from his co-workers and wife.

There's not much else to it. However, for a thin narrative, it does pack an emotional punch. The character begins as a type but ends up as a haunting portrait of desperation. The stories are mundane but they somehow manage to move along at a rapid pace.

This is a great book for the Dostoyevski fan.

This is quite an intriguing little novel, but the publisher's hype about how it "gives voice to the dispossessed" who are driven "to a desperate future" is a bit of a stretch. But what we do have is an inside look at a pathetic figure's creeping madness. The structure of the story is engagingly European (this novel originally appeared overseas in 1995 and here is translated into English for the first time), with a paranoid obsessiveness and a claustrophobic exploration of inner darkness. The story is delivered entirely as a manic-depressive monologue from the lead character, who is on trial for murder. His lifelong descent into madness (or more accurately, despondent anomie) originates with an abusive father and broken down mother, and has continued with the man's fractured animosity toward his failing job and marriage. Along the way, he becomes obsessed with the curmudgeonly, misanthropic philosophy of Blaise Pascal, using that thinker's works to internally justify his miserable outlook on life.

As other reviewers have noted, it might help to have some familiarity with Pascal to understand this novel, though I suspect that the main character explains things pretty well for the uninitiated observer of his downfall. In any case, the literary exploration of Pascal's philosophy is where this novel really starts to slow down, especially in its second half. Pascal's musings on the directionlessness of humanity, as espoused by the main character, merely turn into a standard French preoccupation with social anomie. Meanwhile, weaving the philosopher's views into the storyline becomes more of an academic writing method as exercised by Lydie Salvayre rather than effective storytelling. There is also very little surprise in Salvayre's last-second disclosure of the novel's attempted mystery. Overall, this is still an interesting story for those looking for a surreal alternative to the standard American whodunit, but the novel's initial sense of intrigue and fascination doesn't quite lead to transcendence. [~doomsdayer520~]

The narrator is incarcerated for murder. The victim of this murder is not revealed until the second to last sentence of the book, although one can narrow down the possible choices fairly early on. As a part of his incarceration, the narrator meets with a judge, a doctor, and another individual, presumably his jailor, and recounts portions of his life that attempt to explain what makes him tick - who the person is that committed this murder. He recounts the loveless relationship between his parents and how his own marriage was nearly identical. He speaks of the relationship he has with coworkers and his feelings toward the tour groups for which he serves as a guide in a French museum. And he relates every aspect of his life to the writings and thoughts of his favorite French philosopher, Blaise Pascal. Overall, he rants to his audience in a demonstration of perhaps lunacy, or simply someone completely outside societal norms.

The concept of this novel is interesting as is the presentation as it is completely narrated in the first person. The reader is left to wonder if the narrator's audience is actually there or only a figment of his imagination. The same could be said of his story - has he really committed a murder? Is he truly incarcerated? Or are these the ramblings of someone who desires these things to happen? Are these thoughts but daydreams?

In the end, however, it does not really matter because the story is so strange as to lose the reader's interest. By the end one realizes that no matter what the ramblings reveal, we have not learned much. He is still considered a murderer. He is completely antisocial. And his story is not so interesting as to set him apart from any other common criminal. He had a bad childhood which led into a less than ideal adulthood with which he was dissatisfied. If anything, he becomes less sympathetic when we find out that he just did not get along well with others because he felt superior and yet he wishes to justify a homicide on this set of circumstances. Maybe there is a bigger point that was missed, but it is not clear amidst the narrator's musings.