Serotonin, Michel Houellebecq ; translated by Shaun Whiteside

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The item Serotonin, Michel Houellebecq ; translated by Shaun Whiteside represents a specific, individual, material embodiment of a distinct intellectual or artistic creation found in Randwick City Library.
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Creator

Houellebecq, Michel

Author

Houellebecq, Michel

Translator

Whiteside, Shaun

Contributor

Whiteside, Shaun

Summary

Dissatisfied and discontent, Florent-Claude Labrouste begrudgingly works as an engineer for the Ministry of Agriculture, and is in a self-imposed dysfunctional relationship with a younger woman. When he discovers her ongoing infidelity, he decides to abandon his life in Paris and return to the Normandy countryside of his youth. There he contemplates lost loves and past happiness as he struggles to embed himself in a world that no longer holds any joy for him. His only relief comes in the form of a pill - white, oval, small. Captorix is a new brand of anti-depressant, recently released for public consumption, which works by altering the brain's release of serotonin. With social unrest intensifying around him, and his own depression deepening, Florent-Claude turns to this new medication in the hope that he will find something to live for. Written by one of the most provocative and prophetic novelists of his generation, Serotonin is at once a devastating story of solitude, longing and individual suffering, and a powerful criticism of modern life
A novel made for the Yellow Vest moment... Houellebecq's latest novel, Serotonin, came out in the country last week to rave reviews, and was an instant best-seller, capturing a new moment. It contains a scathing critique of the European Union and imagines farmers blocking roadways and taking up arms against the state. And it arrived in the throes of the “yellow vest” protest movement, an inchoate populist revolt against the government of Emmanuel Macron that sprung up last fall and is causing a national reckoning around the economy...The novel, Houellebecq's seventh, takes its name from the chemical that helps generate a sense of well-being in the human body. In the book, Houellebecq draws a not-so-subtle connection between body and state, between the declining health of the protagonist and the health of French society. The work's themes include the effects of antidepressants on the male libido, the difficulty of sustaining meaningful relationships, and the impossibility of finding happiness, let alone spiritual satisfaction, in a consumer society. Consider it as The Magic Mountain for the post-Brexit era.--The Atlantic, Jan 13 2019. https://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2019/01/michel-houellebecqs-new-book-indictment-eu/580165/ ; viewed 27 September 2019

Language

Work

Publication

London, William Heinemann, 2019

Extent: 309 pages

Note: First published in France in 2019 by Flammarion under the title, Sérotonine

Isbn: 9781785152245

Instance

Label: Serotonin

Title: Serotonin

Statement of responsibility: Michel Houellebecq ; translated by Shaun Whiteside

Creator

Houellebecq, Michel

Contributor

Whiteside, Shaun

Author

Houellebecq, Michel

Translator

Whiteside, Shaun

Subject

Genre

Language

Summary

Dissatisfied and discontent, Florent-Claude Labrouste begrudgingly works as an engineer for the Ministry of Agriculture, and is in a self-imposed dysfunctional relationship with a younger woman. When he discovers her ongoing infidelity, he decides to abandon his life in Paris and return to the Normandy countryside of his youth. There he contemplates lost loves and past happiness as he struggles to embed himself in a world that no longer holds any joy for him. His only relief comes in the form of a pill - white, oval, small. Captorix is a new brand of anti-depressant, recently released for public consumption, which works by altering the brain's release of serotonin. With social unrest intensifying around him, and his own depression deepening, Florent-Claude turns to this new medication in the hope that he will find something to live for. Written by one of the most provocative and prophetic novelists of his generation, Serotonin is at once a devastating story of solitude, longing and individual suffering, and a powerful criticism of modern life
A novel made for the Yellow Vest moment... Houellebecq's latest novel, Serotonin, came out in the country last week to rave reviews, and was an instant best-seller, capturing a new moment. It contains a scathing critique of the European Union and imagines farmers blocking roadways and taking up arms against the state. And it arrived in the throes of the “yellow vest” protest movement, an inchoate populist revolt against the government of Emmanuel Macron that sprung up last fall and is causing a national reckoning around the economy...The novel, Houellebecq's seventh, takes its name from the chemical that helps generate a sense of well-being in the human body. In the book, Houellebecq draws a not-so-subtle connection between body and state, between the declining health of the protagonist and the health of French society. The work's themes include the effects of antidepressants on the male libido, the difficulty of sustaining meaningful relationships, and the impossibility of finding happiness, let alone spiritual satisfaction, in a consumer society. Consider it as The Magic Mountain for the post-Brexit era.--The Atlantic, Jan 13 2019. https://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2019/01/michel-houellebecqs-new-book-indictment-eu/580165/ ; viewed 27 September 2019

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