Author(s): Edouard Leve

Fiction | Dalkey Archive Press

"A book describes works conceived of but not realized by its author." Like Suicide and Autoportrait, Works is another of Eduoard Leve's bewitching reconceptions of what the novel can (or should) do. A list of 533 projects, beginning with its own description -- both likely and unlikely, sober and ridiculous; some of which Leve later realized, most of which he did not -- Works ranks with the fiction of Georges Perec for its seemingly limitless, ingenious, and comical inventiveness. A lampoon of conceptual art -- if not, indeed, an exemplar of its charms at their best -- Works is another piece in the puzzle of Leve's brief and fascinating life.

This book describes works conceived of but not realised by its author, starting with #1: “A book describing works conceived of but not realised by its author”. The following 532 ‘works’ of art and literature are variously conceptual, silly, profound, irritating, revelatory and mercilessly inventive. Some, such as Amérique (a road trip across America to photograph towns named after places not in America), were later realised, but for many reading about them is sufficient (or the only possible way) to extract their worth (if they have worth). Here’s another, chosen at random: #72 “The eraser residues of all the students in a fine arts institute are collected for a year and assembled into a cube”. And another: #282 “Drawings are made while the artist is suffering from a blinding migraine that obscures the centre of his visual field”. I will add one of my own: #534 “A book is briefly reviewed by a man who was born on the same day in the same year as the author and a half-hearted attempt is made to make this coincidence significant”.

{THOMAS}