The possibility of an island
The Possibility of an Island (French title: La possibilité d'une île ) is a science fiction - novel by Michel Houellebecq in 2005. The so far only translated into German by Uli Wittmann appeared in the same year in the DuMont literature and -Kunst-Verlag , Cologne .
Brief content
The plot of the novel takes place on two different time levels:
- In the 20th / 21st Century (first-person narrator is Daniel1 ),
- about 2000 years later (first-person narrator is Daniel24 , later Daniel25 ).
In the 1st time level , Daniel1 describes how he becomes a celebrated star. Numerous sexual encounters with women do not leave a lasting impression. Something like a relationship is only created with two women. Isabelle, who becomes his wife, and, after this marriage is broken, Esther, a young actress, 25 years younger than him. Both relationships end miserably and Daniel is left alone and abandoned. His only loyal companion is his dog Fox. The life of the first-person narrator is determined by the search for love until the end.
In the 2nd time level , first Daniel24, then Daniel25 consider Daniel1. Only at the end of the novel does Daniel25 decide to break out of an uneventful life of contemplation . He and his dog go looking for “an island” where a full life may still be possible.
Content and structure
Now time (1st time level)
Here the life story of Daniel1, a cynic and successful comedian of our time is told, which clearly contains autobiographical traits of the author.
At the center of this life of great prosperity is the search for love. But neither with his wife Isabell, nor later with his young lover Esther, does the narrator find the lasting fulfillment he is looking for.
By chance Daniel1 comes into contact with the sect of the " Elohimiten ", who maintain a center in Lanzarote where they also conduct research on the artificial replication of humans. Daniel1 joins this sect.
When the leader of the sect, "the Prophet", is killed, his illegitimate son Vincent takes his place. The sect claims that they successfully cloned the Prophet and poses Vincent as his replicant. The PR coup succeeds and Daniel1 is from now on firmly connected to the sect as a confidante of the fraud.
Future (2nd time level)
2000 years later: The earth has undergone major climatic and geological changes as a result of wars, atomic explosions and a shift in the earth's axis. The seas have disappeared except for a scanty remnant of water. The successors of the first first-person narrator Daniel1 reflect on his life and describe their world like innocent observers.
The people of the future
Most people have died out because they seem unable to love. That is, they no longer reproduced. At this point the author equates love with the sexual reproduction of individuals. The few surviving people have fallen back to a pre-civilizational level. These "savages" live in the ruins from the 21st century. Utensils such as car seats and plastic suitcases have survived as silent witnesses to ancient civilization. Most of these items, however, are completely useless and incomprehensible to the savages in their world. They live in small, strongly hierarchically organized tribes. Only the leaders have the right to mate with females. Old, weak tribesmen are killed and eaten in cruel and bloody rituals.
Neo people
There is another kind of people called " neo-people ". The neo-humans live isolated as individuals, scattered all over the world in self-sufficient high-security high-tech stations, shielded from the environment. They are a new species of humans created through genetic engineering, who meet their energy needs through photosynthesis and whose ability to show emotions has been reduced. Neo-humans communicate with one another via the Internet. There is no personal physical contact. The residential wards are monitored and maintained by "Central City" and supplied with the little supplies that a neo-human still needs. Essentially, drinking water and mineral salt are sufficient for him. When a person dies, an approx. 18-year-old copy of the deceased is generated directly in Central City from the genetic code stored there, using advanced genetic engineering , and delivered to the ward. There the copy then replaces its deceased predecessor. The technical process of giving the successor the experiences and memories of the original person only works incompletely. However, it is sufficient that he can read and write and operate the equipment on his station.
The neo-humans are "descendants" of the sect of the "Elohimites" that emerged at the end of the twentieth century . A sect whose beliefs include the existence of aliens who once landed on earth in their spaceships, created humans using genetic engineering and will one day come back to take the followers of the sect with them. One of the goals of the sect in the present time was the construction of an embassy building for the aliens, the research and use of genetic engineering with the aim of genetically improving, cloning and immortalizing people, as well as a sexually permissive life. With these goals in mind, the sect will quickly gain numerous new members in the near future and will quickly become the most important world religion. Whoever becomes a member of the sect bequeaths all of his property to the sect after his death. In return, his DNA is preserved and he is made “immortal” through cloning.
The neo-humans lead a contemplative life, fully aware that they are not the final stage of human development, but will at some point be replaced by the "future" - a kind of superhuman in Nietzsche's sense . Their "eternal life" is actually boring, but the ability to feel bored, like many other human emotions, has been designed away from them. The supreme religious authority of the neo-humans is the "highest sister". Your doctrines are not so much binding doctrines as they are designed as practical help in life. One of the most important tasks of a neo-human is to read the life story of the person from whom they are descended and to comment on it if possible. With curious incomprehension, the neo-people read in these life stories of human passions such as love and greed for money or sexual fulfillment.
The constant search for fulfillment and that which Daniel1 knew as love is symbolized by the island of Lanzarote , of which the neo-people do not know whether it really still exists, but on which neo-people may have come together for a to lead another life. It is the "possibility of an island" that drives Marie23 and Daniel25 to break out of their orderly, "eternal" but monotonous life, for which they have to pay with their death or mortality, because the rules of neo-humans provide that the apostate stations are closed and no more successors are created.
When Daniel25 finally reached the “infinite” sea after a long journey, he understood why the thought of infinity had such a great fascination on people that the desire for infinite life, for immortality could arise from it. He realizes that he will no longer reach his destination Lanzarote. He is not redeemed, but neither is he unhappy.
construction
A little more than half of the novel consists of the life story of the first first-person narrator ( Daniel1 , 1st time level). This life story covers his entire adult life. Interspersed between the chapters of this life story are the considerations of the descendants Daniel24 and Daniel25 (2nd time level): First a foreword by Daniel24, the 23rd descendant of Daniel1. Then Daniel24 and Daniel25 comment on Daniel1's life story. Daniel24 deals with the first part of the life story and Daniel25 with the second.
In the last part of the book Daniel25 tells how - stimulated by the previous exchange of ideas with Marie23 - he followed her example, unsatisfied with the monotonous eternal life, left his own station and went in search of understanding for the lost human feelings that he was only expressing knows the life stories but cannot understand them.
backgrounds
The beliefs of the sect of the "Elohimites" described in the novel are based on the New Religious Movement of the Raëlians .
Houellebecq became aware of the Raëlians in 2002 when they publicly announced that they had given birth to a cloned baby. In a newspaper interview, Houellebecq defended the Raëlians and human cloning.
Impact history
Iggy Pop counts the novel as one of the sources of inspiration for his 2009 album Préliminaires . His music provided the basis for a documentary by filmmaker Erik Lieshout entitled "Les Derniers Mots de Michel Houellebecq". Among other things, Pop took Daniel's dog Fox as a model for the song "King of the dogs".
filming
With Benoît Magimel in the lead role, Houellebecq, in cooperation with the WDR and the Filmstiftung NRW, brought a film version to the screen in 2008 that is loosely based on his novel. However, due to mostly devastating reviews at the premiere at the Locarno Film Festival , the production has not yet found an international distribution. The film was broadcast on Arte in July 2011.
Stage version
The director Robert Borgmann and the Berliner Ensemble premiered a three-hour stage version of The Possibility of an Island, including a break . In it he explores the human condition of aging and cultural pessimism.
literature
The book by Michel Houellebecq
- French (original): La possibilité d'une Île , Broché - Fayard, August 2005 - 485 pages - ISBN 2213625476
- German: The possibility of an island , (German by Uli Wittmann), hardcover edition - Dumont Literature and Art Verlag, August 2005 - 445 pages - ISBN 3832179283
- English: The Possibility Of An Island , (translated from the French by Gavin Bowd), Paperback - Phoenix Press, July 2006 - 432 Pages - ISBN 0753821184
Web links
- Collection of reviews of the book at perlentaucher.de
- Mostly negative review in the Guardian.
swell
- Raëlians have a new fan In: Tages-Anzeiger Online . December 18, 2003
- Iggy Pop pays homage to "Punk" Houellebecq In: stern.de . May 19, 2009
- The possibility of a soundtrack In: Kölner Stadt-Anzeiger . May 29, 2009
Footnotes
- ↑ Iggy Pop: Trailer for "Préliminares". Retrieved May 27, 2009 .
- ↑ La possibilité d'une île: In the end, no love. Retrieved May 27, 2009 .
- ↑ Literary drama: Quark without sex. Retrieved July 7, 2011 .
- ↑ Hartmut Krug: The Possibility of an Island - Berliner Ensemble: “Die Unerträlichkeit des Aging” , review on nachtkritik.de of October 9, 2019, accessed October 13, 2019
This article represents the opinion of the authors. It is based on their own reading of the book. Sources are the above-mentioned editions of the novel.