Expansion of the combat zone

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Expansion of the combat zone is a novel by the French writer Michel Houellebecq . It appeared in 1994 under the original title Extension du domaine de la lutte . Overall, the book was translated into over 20 languages ​​and was awarded the Grand Prix national des lettres and the Prix ​​Flore for the best first novel. The German translation by Leopold Federmair followed in 1999.

Also in 1999, the French director Philippe Harel filmed the novel under the same (French) title. Harel also played the lead role.

In 2000, WDR produced the radio play of the same name with director Martin Zylka .

content

The nameless, 30-year-old first-person narrator works as a well-paid computer scientist in a Parisian software company. His sparse and limited social contacts result only from his job, and he usually spends the weekends completely alone. His last intimate relationship with a woman was more than two years ago.

He is assigned by his company to take over the implementation of new software for the Ministry of Agriculture. Together with his colleague Tisserand, he has to make three trips to the provinces. Tisserand is constantly boasting about stories of women that he doesn't even experience because he is terribly ugly and all women flee as soon as he comes near them. Although he says he could afford a prostitute every week with his salary , he has not yet had any sexual experience.

In La Roche-sur-Yon , the team's third station, the frustrated Tisserand is slowly going crazy. The narrator offers to spend Christmas Eve with him in a disco in Les Sables-d'Olonne ; Tisserand agrees. The narrator watches the futile advertising Tisserand for a while. When the latter approaches a girl who looks like the narrator's ex-girlfriend, the narrator goes nuts. But Tisserand is soon outshone by a young black guy, with whom the girl leaves the disco a little later.

The narrator convinces Tisserand that Tisserand will never own a woman's heart and body, but can at least own her life and soul through murder. They follow the couple who retreat to the beach for sex. Tisserand pursues them with a knife, but then does not bring himself to the murder. During the night he drives back to Paris and dies in a traffic accident.

The narrator then also goes downhill, he just sits in his apartment for days. He has nightmares at night . He wants to spend New Year's Eve in his parents' home village in southern France. He comes to Lyon , where he spends the night in the train station among junkies and homeless people . The next morning he drives back to Paris. Eventually he went to psychiatric treatment where he was diagnosed with depression . In the last scene of the novel, using all his strength, he rides his bicycle into the forest of Mazas, which is in the mountains. The end of this journey remains open. In this scene, parallels to Georg Büchner's Lenz were seen.

title

The title expansion of the combat zone refers to a comparison between economy and sexuality that the first-person narrator draws:

“In a fully liberal economic system, a few accumulate considerable wealth; others degenerate into unemployment and misery. In a completely liberal sexual system, some have varied and exciting sex lives; others are limited to masturbation and loneliness. The economic liberalism is the advanced combat zone, that is, it applies to all ages and social classes . Likewise, sexual liberalism means the expansion of the combat zone, its extension to all ages and social classes. "

- Michel Houellebecq : expansion of the combat zone

reception

When it appeared, the novel caused a sensation, especially in the feature pages, and established Houellebecq's reputation as a scandalous author. The scene in which the first-person narrator asks his colleague to commit sexual murder was the focus of many discussions. In Germany, the novel came to some popularity not least through a review in the program Das Literarisches Quartett in 1999. Quite soon, however, the focus shifted to the successor novel Elementary Particles , which led to the fact that relatively little literary research has been carried out to expand the combat zone .

What is striking about the numerous reviews of the novel is the relatively imprecise handling of its real content. Often the Houellebecq phenomenon is the focus of interest rather than the details of the plot or character descriptions. Many critics tended to identify the nameless first-person narrator with the author Michel Houellebecq, which led to the fact that he was sometimes referred to as "Michel".

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Thomas Hübener, Maladien for millions , p. 209 ff.
  2. ↑ Expansion of the combat zone . Rowohlt, Reinbek near Hamburg 2000, p. 108f. ISBN 3-499-22730-4
  3. ↑ Thomas Hübener, Maladien for millions , p. 17 ff.
  4. ↑ Numerous examples of interpretations based on imprecise readings are listed by Thomas Hübener in his book Maladien für Mio (p. 17–39).
  5. ↑ cf. about Rita Schober, on the test bench. Zola - Houellebecq - Klemperer , Berlin (2003), p. 271 ff.

literature

  • Dion, Robert: Faire la bête. Les fictions animalières dans "Extension du domaine de la lutte". In: Van Wesemael, Sabine (ed.): Michel Houellebecq. Amsterdam: Rodopi 2004. (French)
  • Hübener, Thomas: Maladia for millions . A study on Michel Houellebecq's "Expansion of the combat zone". Hanover: Wehrhahn, 2007. ISBN 978-3-86525-064-3
  • Monnin, Christian: Extinction du domaine de la lutte. (PDF; 95 kB) Article about Michel Houellebecq's novels. (French)

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