''A Void'', translated from the original French ( "The Disappearance"), is a 300-page French lipogrammatic

novel A novel is a relatively long work of narrative fiction, typically written in prose and published as a book. The present English word for a long work of prose fiction derives from the for "new", "news", or "short story of something new", itsel ...

, written in 1969 by Georges Perec, entirely without using the letter '' e'', following

Oulipo Oulipo (, short for french: Ouvroir de littérature potentielle; roughly translated: ''"workshop of potential literature"'', stylized ''OuLiPo'') is a loose gathering of (mainly) French-speaking writers and mathematicians who seek to create works ...

constraints.

Translations

It was translated into English by Gilbert Adair, with the title ''A Void'', for which he won the Scott Moncrieff Prize in 1995. Three other English translations are titled ''A Vanishing'' by Ian Monk, ''Vanish'd!'' by John Lee, and ''Omissions'' by Julian West. All translators have imposed upon themselves a similar lipogrammatic constraint to the original, avoiding the most commonly used letter of the

alphabet An alphabet is a standardized set of basic written graphemes (called letters) that represent the phonemes of certain spoken languages. Not all writing systems represent language in this way; in a syllabary, each character represents a s ...

. This precludes the use of words normally considered essential such as ("I"), ("and"), and (masculine "the") in French, as well as "me", "be", and "the" in English. The Spanish version contains no '' a'', which is the second most commonly used letter in the Spanish language (first being ''e''), while the Russian version contains no о. The Japanese version does not use syllables containing the sound "i" (, , , etc.) at all.

Plot summary

''A Void'' plot follows a group of individuals looking for a missing companion, Anton Vowl. It is in part a

parody A parody, also known as a spoof, a satire, a send-up, a take-off, a lampoon, a play on (something), or a caricature, is a creative work designed to imitate, comment on, and/or mock its subject by means of satiric or ironic imitation. Often its su ...

of '' noir'' and

horror fiction Horror is a genre of fiction which is intended to frighten, scare, or disgust. Horror is often divided into the sub-genres of psychological horror and supernatural horror, which is in the realm of speculative fiction. Literary historian J. ...

, with many stylistic tricks, gags, plot twists, and a grim conclusion. On many occasions it implicitly talks about its own lipogrammatic limitation, highlighting its unusual syntax. ''A Void'' protagonists finally work out which symbol is missing, but find it a hazardous topic to discuss, as any who try to bypass this story's constraint risk dying. Philip Howard, writing a lipogrammatic appraisal of ''A Void'' in his column ''Lost Words'', said "This is a story chock-full of plots and sub-plots, of loops within loops, of trails in pursuit of trails, all of which allow its author an opportunity to display his customary virtuosity as an avant-gardist magician, acrobat and clown."

Major themes

Both of Georges Perec's parents perished in

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the World War II by country, vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great power ...

: his father as a soldier and his mother in the

Holocaust The Holocaust, also known as the Shoah, was the genocide of European Jews during World War II. Between 1941 and 1945, Nazi Germany and its collaborators systematically murdered some six million Jews across German-occupied Europe; ...

. He was brought up by his aunt and uncle after surviving the war.

Warren Motte Warren F. Motte is a Professor of French and Comparative Literature at the University of Colorado Boulder. His focus is contemporary writing, with an emphasis upon experimental, avant-garde, or other subversive forms of both fiction and poetry. ...

interprets the absence of the letter ''e'' in the book as a metaphor for Perec's own sense of loss and incompleteness:

Versions

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References

External links