Posted by Lale on 23/2/2009, 14:13:07, in reply to "Re: Alain Robbe-Grillet, Jealousy - This post contains SPOLIERS"
72.138.111.169
Good work, I enjoyed reading your summary. It does confirm some of mys suspicions, which I attributed to my lack of understanding, such as the novel:
"In one place it seems clear that A and Franck have both finished reading the Africa novel before going to town. In another, they seem to have already been to town, and A is only a fourth of the way through the novel."
I had made this observation myself but I thought I was remembering incorrectly or maybe I had misunderstood.
Lale
--Previous Message--
:
: Well, I've reread this book and read it with as much
: attention as possible. I made several pages of notes.
: I don't think it's possible to establish a timeline.
: The narrative contradicts itself. In one place it
: seems clear that A and Franck have both finished
: reading the Africa novel before going to town. In
: another, they seem to have already been to town, and A
: is only a fourth of the way through the novel. In one
: place, the centipede is killed the day after they
: started planning the trip. In another it seems to
: happen on the same evening. A and Franck make two
: trips: the one to town and one so she can visit
: Christiane. Sometimes it seems that when they come
: back from town, both get out of the car, and when they
: come back from visiting Christiane, only A gets out.
: But in one of the places where only A has gotten out
: and she is leaning through the window, the narrator
: thinks she is probably gathering her purchases. It
: seems that the narrator cleans away the mark of the
: centipede while Franck and A are in town, and then it
: seems that the mark is still there after they've come
: back.
:
: I don't think any violence occurs within the book. A
: seems to be in her room when the native is looking
: down into the stream. At one point, she seems to be
: watching him. I suppose it could be possible that
: Franck's body is there. There is an occasion when
: Franck is expected for lunch or dinner but doesn't
: show up. This issue is somewhat clouded by the men
: working on the bridge. Is the man peering into the
: water one of them? He seems to be alone. At one point,
: Franck seems to be driving away at the time the men
: are working.
:
: I don't think there's much of a story to this novel. I
: think it's a portrayal of jealousy, of that state of
: mind, an illogical state of mind at least in this
: case. The narrator's mind is sometimes very
: disordered. I wonder if he is not drunk on the evening
: on which Franck and A are away. Things seem to be
: swirling in his vision.
:
: The narrative contains a few things which seem
: objectives correlative to the novel itself: the knot
: in A's hair, the flight of the beetle, the song of the
: second driver.
:
: Why, by the way, is he called the second driver? Who
: is the first driver? There are a lot of such questions
: with this book. Why do A and Franck switch chairs at
: one point? Why are we told about a hole where a nail
: or screw once was. Why do the lights go out on the
: narrator? I guess there are no answers to any of
: these.
:
: I don't mean to say that I dislike it, but I think I
: can put this book away for a long time now.
:
