[Platform] by [[Michel Houellebecq]]

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[Platform] by [[Michel Houellebecq]]

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1Matari
Set 2, 2006, 3:45 pm

Hated this - nasty woman-hating pornography basically; similarly his latest - Possibility of an Island I put down in disgustx. Can't see why Houellebecq is even called an author, his books are so awful. Anyone else feel the same, or is it just me?

2KromesTomes
Set 5, 2006, 12:06 pm

Well, I saw this as a love story about people involved in a consensual, if out of the ordinary, sexual relationship, who were then confronted by others who feel an irrational need to impose their ideas of morality on the rest of humanity ... what I found scary was the convergence between the views of the book's Islamic terrorists and many in the U.S. regarding this particular point.

3Jebbie74 Primeira Mensagem
Set 6, 2006, 5:04 pm

I wouldn't say that I hated his work. It definately bordered along the lines of erotica and I read it a long time before I had even heard of that genre. I'd certainly be willing to try another Houellebecq book.

4virose_pt
Jan 29, 2007, 5:21 am

Esta mensagem foi removida pelo seu autor.

5virose_pt
Editado: Jan 29, 2007, 5:22 am

I read The Elementary Particles and enjoyed it. Platform is in my TBR pile and I think I'm going to like it also.

6workingonit
Mar 27, 2007, 6:31 pm

Haven't read Platform but I can tell you that Atomised is abysmal. Houellebecq writes like a sociologist; he's not a novelist at all. Having said that, there were a couple of points where I laughed out loud, though I can't remember whether the humour was intentional.

7workingonit
Mar 27, 2007, 6:32 pm

Esta mensagem foi removida pelo seu autor.

8Periodista Primeira Mensagem
Editado: Ago 12, 2007, 2:24 pm

>>KromesTomes wrote: ..then confronted by others who feel an irrational need to impose their ideas of morality on the rest of humanity ...


Do you mean how French (and German, for that matter) tourists come to countries like Thailand and insist on walking around on beaches topless and nude, even though the single thing Thais very politely request is that tourists dress relatively modestly? A rare Thai woman even owns a bathing suit. A Thai man walking around without shirt is pretty rude too. They don't quite expect that of foreigners ... but a little modesty? A little respect for their cultural mores? Maybe you could at least cover your shoulders and not wear tube tops or shorts in a temple? That's why every friggin' guidebook and guide and hotel magazine makes the point--way too politely.


Maybe you could also tip on occasion and not be rude to waiters and waitresses? Maybe you could learn a few, very few words of the local language? Like "Thank you"?


Thais wouldn't dare directly confront a French tourist on these points but I've tried gently on occasion ...you get that smirk and fuck-you shrug: they've got the money, they're buying these dark-skinned people. That's what they are for.
Boy, and Cambodians and Laotians are a lot less reserved in their opinions of French tourists (which rank even lower than German ones, in their view).


I ended up reading this boring book in French when I was on this small Thai island without anything else to read. The pornography, I think, is deliberately dull. Supposedly, Houellebecq wrote it in Thailand, although it's claimed he doesn't speak English, which means it's extremely unlikely he'd get very far in Thai, a tonal language. (In these parts, French people are rather famously bad at languages.) Can't imagine how he could get around but, any rate, point is ... the geography is wrong. Can't remember the details now ...maybe it was that he had Koh Lanta in Gulf of Siam instead of the other side of the peninsula in the Andaman Sea, stuff like that.


Then there's Krabi, where the bitch of a girlfriend gets blown up. Boo hoo. Not soon enough. Now, this is an area that, prior to the tourist boom--30 years ago, say--was predominantly Muslim. The Muslim fishermen communities of bigger resorts like the islands of Koh Samui and Phuket also had fairly large Muslim populations.


Thai Muslims, at least this far north, are very relaxed, fun people--like most Thais. OK, they don't generally drink, but it's ok if you do. They don't wear head scarves and the like. (well, they've just started to ...I noticed on Koh Lanta last year). But they do have much stricter views and practices than most Thai Buddhists regarding prostitution, divorce, extramarital sex and premarital sex. Not matter how poor they are, not many Muslim girls end up in brothels--unlike many girls from richer Buddhist Thai families. When the backpacker tourists turned up 30 years ago in Krabi ...they didn't overtly disturb the way of life. Muslim families could still protect their children from seeing some of the worst excesses of Thai Buddhist towns and cities: drinking, adultery, abandonment of families, the huge sex industry.


I don't think Houllebecq realized this when he picked Krabi out of a hat. The Muslim women working in the tourist industry wouldn't be easy to identify. They're outnumbered today. I don't recall a mosque near the beaches. It was just a coincidence that he picked this place. His Muslim bombers were supposed to come out of ...well, I don't know. I doubt he was even aware of the old separatist insurgencies in the far South. There was nothing in this book to indicate that he did any history reading re Cuba or Thailand. (Were there any writers in prison in his Cuba?)


Krabi is quite built up and package touristy today. Not as bad as Phuket as far as the sex industry (Phuket seemed to be the real setting for this episode--but , hey,this guy had geography problems ). But yeah, there would be some prostitute services and god knows, fat naked smoking Europeans populating the beaches, the men soliciting every young Thai woman in sight. And loads and loads of Bangkok, etc., Buddhist Thais running the tourist industry.

How do you think the native Muslims feel? Why are they so "irrational", KromesTomes, not to want to accept neo-colonial French behavior without resentment and discomfort? The tsunami hit Krabi and killed lots of locals and tourists ... would it be so irrational to think that some were being punished for their behavior?


Why do poorer countries have to accept, without complaint, whatever these tourists want to do and buy? Couldn't they just stay home?
I thought while reading it that it was an attempt at satire ... French re-colonization, the commodification of every human interaction, people rick enough to do just about anything, yet all they did was pursue empty sexual thrills, etc., .. but perhaps my French wasn't up to detecting the nuances? That's what I wondered. However, I later read a couple of reviews when it came out in English, one of them by Francine Prose, and no one picked up on that, so ... I think it's just a stupid, callous attempt at a novel.

9PossMan
Editado: Ago 12, 2007, 3:18 pm

I have found his work more likeable with time. "Atomised" was very hard work but "Platform" was better and "Possibility of an Island" I quite liked. Not sure about the gibes at tourists. Passing through Aldeburgh (a small town on the Norfolk coast) on a meandering journey from Kent to Scotland just last month my wife made small talk with the local coastguard to be told the town was fine apart from the 'grockles'. Grockles instantly translates as a code for 'tourists' so the remark obviously intended as an insult. Nevertheless the town was doing good business and making good money out of tourism.

10nperrin
Ago 13, 2007, 10:14 am

The tsunami hit Krabi and killed lots of locals and tourists ... would it be so irrational to think that some were being punished for their behavior?

Yes, it would be irrational. Just like it would be irrational to think that Hurricane Katrina was punishing New Orleans as some kind of modern-day Gomorrah. KromesTomes is right to point out the similarity.

Why do poorer countries have to accept, without complaint, whatever these tourists want to do and buy? Couldn't they just stay home?

Well, as PossMan points out, "Nevertheless the town was doing good business and making good money out of tourism."