A Legacy of Spies - John le Carré

 

And after complaining about Jonathan Coe, Ali Smith and Ian McEwan for their attempts to either bring their sagas full circle, or to write omni-comprehensive books to capture decades' worth of British history, here comes le Carré and swiftly succeeds where so many of my favourite contemporary British authors failed. 

Granted, it may be an easy exercise for a brilliant writer to play on his readers' nostalgia, to largely repeat plot devices that worked for literally dozens of his novels before, and to essentially spend half of his time making reference to his previous novels. 

Yet, this is a superb way to settle the unanswered questions from The Spy Who Came from the Cold and to add another further layer to George Smiley while painting him as considerably less unblemished than in Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy

The Seventh Function of Language - Laurent Binet

 

Having read Perspective(s), and having found it a fairly pleasant easy read, I decided to read The Seventh Function of Language because it is meant to be Binet's "magnum opus". 

I do realize it sounds ever so slightly stereotypical, but this pseudo-intellectual French novel is pompous, vainglorious, pretentious and, ultimately, plain bad. 

It's probably written so that people who like to think of themselves as erudite can giggle as they sip their port in front of their fireplace because they've just read a name that they recognize and can feel all smug about it (you've heard of Derrida, then?!? Bravo!). 

Also, my heartfelt congratulations to the author for the plain characterization of every single French intellectual of the second half of the 20th century. Over hundreds of pages I didn't manage to learn anything new about this people (and I don't know much about them, to be frank) as they are portrayed with less depth than what one would find in A Very Short Introduction to Literary Theory by Oxford University Press. 

No matter how trite is to read of Foucault as "the great bald man", it pales in comparison to the references to Camille Paglia (like her or not, she may deserve something more than just being referred to as "Cruella DeVil") or the cameo of a certain Judith - who doesn't have a second name, unfortunately, but is generally referred to as "the lesbian" (unfortunately there can't be any doubt as to who said Judith is, and I think labelling one of the greatest living American thinkers by her sexuality is something that no remotely intelligent people to the left of Trump can do). 

So to conclude: well done Binet, you've managed to stir in me the same hatred for a book that I felt for The Da Vinci Code.