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The Flight of Icarus
by
Raymond Queneau
general information | review summaries | our review | links | about the author
| Title: | The Flight of Icarus |
| Author: | Raymond Queneau |
| Genre: | Novel |
| Written: | 1968 (Eng. 1973) |
| Length: | 192 pages |
| Original in: | French |
| Availability: | The Flight of Icarus - US |
| The Flight of Icarus - UK | |
| The Flight of Icarus - Canada | |
| Le vol d'Icare - Canada | |
| The Flight of Icarus - India | |
| Le vol d'Icare - France | |
| Icaro involato - Italia |
- Translated by Barbara Wright
- French title: Le vol d'Icare
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Our Assessment:
A- : a slight but clever literary game, very entertaining
See our review for fuller assessment.
| Source | Rating | Date | Reviewer |
|---|---|---|---|
| New Statesman | . | 13/7/1973 | John Sturrock |
| The New Yorker | . | 25/2/1974 | John Updike |
| TLS | . | 3/8/1973 | . |
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The complete review's Review:
Queneau has come up with a charming premise for his novel, set in Paris in the fin de siècle 1890's.
The French author Hubert has begun writing a novel, only to have his main character -- Icarus -- disappear.
Not just metaphorically, but physically.
And so off Hubert goes, in search of his character.
Pirandellian one of the characters calls his dilemma, as it indeed it is.
And Queneau has Pirandellian fun with it.
Told in the form of a drama, in 74 short chapters (or scenes), the misadventures of Icarus, an unformed innocent, and Hubert, who keeps searching for Icarus in all the wrong places are recounted.
There's a great deal of clever literary play here, commentary on both the Aesthetes of the late 1800's and modern fiction, and Queneau has any number of literary tricks up his sleeve.
It's all exceptionally well done, with many a twist to it, and a great deal of fun.
Barbara Wright's translation also manages to capture the playfulness of the original very well.
It is a slight book -- an entertainment -- but it is also a very good one.
Strongly recommended.
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The Flight of Icarus:
- New Directions publicity page
- Einaudi publicity page
- Raymond Queneau at books and writers
- Fonds Queneau - useful Queneau site, French and English
- Interview from Review of Contemporary Fiction
- Reading Raymond Queneau by Barbara Wright, in Context
- Caricature by David Levine
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French author Raymond Queneau (1903-1976) is one of the most influential figures in modern French literature. He was General Secretary of the publisher Gallimard, and one of the founders of the Oulipo.
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© 1999-2021 the complete review
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