There was a time when you read French literary novels in order to cultivate a certain kind of sophisticated suspicion. Post-modern writers like Robbe-Grillet, Ricardou and Perec were hyper-aware of the political and philosophical problems underlying traditional realist narratives. They produced novels that were as much critiques of novel writing as they were actual stories with actual characters.
Nowadays, however, one might go to the French section of a bookshop looking for something more Balzacian. One might read Houellebecq for his excoriating critiques of our political culture, or Édouard Louis for an exposé of the prejudices fostered by French working-class life. These are very different writers, but they have in common a desire to do more than just wring their hands over the problems of representation. These are writers who have something to say and say it.
Éric Vuillard’s The Order of the Day, which won the Prix Goncourt in 2017 and which is brought to English audiences in Mark Polizzotti’s translation, is a curious addition to this movement.
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