Michel Houllebecq's Submission

A discussion of Michel Houellebecq’s novel Submission
with translator Lorin Stein, Emily Apter, Eric Banks, Tom Bishop, and Adam Shatz

[@mengelmoesNL]

Islam means Submission... that's why he chose that title.

[@ObeySilence]

+Bettertext youre sooo smart

[@mengelmoesNL]

+Obey Silence lol, can't remember why I made that comment :) Probably because somebody in the video doesn't get it.

[@ddioppp]

I thought the same as you. They didnt mention what you said when they talked about it.

[@christopher9152]

Bettertext From any reasonable point of view (assuming their goal is to shed light on the book...), that should have been the very first thing mentioned when the title was discussed at the beginning. However, it is a panel of typical PC-centric, Leftist academic types, and as all good Comrades in the Struggle undertand, any talk, however (or especially? )factual, which might be somehow considered critical of "oppressed minorites," must be intuitively recognized as Crimethink and supressed. Emily A. mentioned the meaning within the context of gender relations, which is, of course, very safe ground if the reference is to men's perecieved power over women, but she did so without explicitly phrasing it within the ISLAMIC frame of ideology and culture, which would have been very unsafe ground for a modern liberal, indeed. The fact that ths frame was implied could be considered a small victory by some, I suppose.

[@paulcurtis2642]

Yeah, that’s right... Islam translates as submission. The moment I heard the first sentence about ‘definitions of submission’ I knew this video would be a complete waste of time. Over an hour of twats talking shite

[@destroydate7887]

All of Michel Houellebecq's fiction can be read as "black comedies"directed towards a type of french society which lives in a class bubble. And he truly dislikes this type of culture.

[@larry811]

A discussion one should expect from old men and academic women.: a chatty impotence prevails.

[@torelarsenn]

haha, its almost straight from a Houellebecq novel. These academics cant enjoy their mirror image in Houellebecq novels.

[@alley2405]

Lorin's translation captures Houellebecq's tone well, any one who has read more than one of Houellebecq's novels will notice that immediately. Carol Sweeney's book length study called "Michel Houellebecq: Literature of Despair" provides a lot of insights into Houellebecq's novels beyond "is he sexist, is he racist" stuff, but it was written before Submission and is very academic and hard to source, I even think it was the first book length study on Houellebecq. Anyway, thanks for the upload.

[@Marenqo]

Its very odd to see no muslims on the panel!

[@casparwijn]

next time you have 5 people in one discussion, please use more that two hand held mics.. The audio quality made it impossible to watch this video till the end..

[@anathema2me4EVR]

Don't they know that they a the type of lefty hacks that feature in his novel?

[@bulkington3272]

I was just thinking these are the professors in the novel that convert to keep their jobs. Except Emily of course she was fired

[@camerafree]

What these microphones were doing over there? If you don't use it, just turn it off, then. Terrible audio capture.

[@ANPHKI]

+Renan Rovaris Oh my god, with these people who just complain and don't contribute anything... So you are an expert on the matter? Yup, thought so... ; )

[@camerafree]

+ANPHKI Well, you're complain about people who complain. So, I guess we're the same kind of people ;) By the way, you don't need to be a microphone expert to know when someone messed up with the sound record.

[@TrevRockOne]

Anyone who uses the word "islamophobia" seriously is someone not worth taking seriously.

[@DelgonidoDargo]

TrevRockOne a phobia is an irrational fear. There’s nothing irrational here

[@Lacke1]

Nothing proves how fanatical today's Islamophobia is, like the aggressive denial of its existence.

[@Ozgipsy]

They all seem very “New York”. Islam was just a realistic foil. It was about France.

[@StudyFinnish]

Is the translator really saying at 51:35 that "my French isn't really good"?

[@buddesatva]

Appreciate the posting. The audio makes it very difficult to follow.

[@pennyhiroshi7561]

I started to read it and thought it was a mistake to use american english to translate the book. It was hard for me to read. He should have used a Brit.

[@sunnydays405]

You guys in the comments don't understand the point of the book, Houellebecq is definitely not directly criticizing Islam, it's almost as if he wonders if an Islamic change is necessary in Europe for a better life for the average man despite the fact he will be in a state of "submission' and giving up many freedoms. If anything, ge is criticizing the way Western culture has progressed to this point.

[@spritualelitist665]

Yeah some part of him is very reactionary. He doesn't like liberalism like myself but we do see a rise of nationalism in Europe especially in France which understands this issue. Islam has always been right wing but I feel it doesn't fit Europe. It's not what we are. But we are not liberals as well.

[@sandworm9528]

​@spirituallyitist665 nothing fits anywhere, the world itself is out of joint

[@dirtycelinefrenchman]

Transposing the common idiom of his time into literature is one of Houellebecq’s chief accomplishments. Or as these cloistered academics put it, “writing stupid.”

[@MarcNash]

AN august institution like NYU and they can't afford a mic for each panellist?

[@christopher9152]

Due to poor sound quality, I confess I gave up about halfway through. What I did hear, though, was a sometimes interesting discussion seriously hampered by the fact that most of the panel members have in no uncertain terms revealed themselves to be othodox liberals/Leftists in their political viewpoints, something which can hardly be separated (at least not without great conscious effort) from their readings of key elements of the book. Even Foucault was approvingly name checked by Emily Apter [sic?] at one point; a refererence to such an oblique and uncelebrated figure made by an American professor in the Humanties, especially literature, is truly shocking. In any case, I would offer that there is nothing "goofy" about the scenario at the end of the book, though the outsized satirical element is obvious. It is in perfect keeping with the main target of Houellebecq's satire in Submission: the unfathomable hipocrysy of the Western liberal elite, a category into which most or all of the panel members could be placed, albeit close to if not on the bottom rung. Futher, it is an established fact that the Left in general, both in Europe and the U.S., has embraced Muslims in their hierarchy of victims, such that we now can be regularly treated to the sad yet humorous spectacle of American and Western European feminists demonstrating in support of "Muslim rights," defending genuinely patriarchical cultures that typically treat women at best as second class citizens, and at worst as property, even as these same feminists gin up fact-free university campus rape hysteria aimed at the soft targets of archetypal "white frat bros" and push the ludicrous myth of a Western "rape culture." Yet such voices are either stridently supportive or deafeningly silent when it comes to letting millions of young men hailing from actual rape cultures enter and move freely about Europe, with the consequent, and entirely foreseeable, rocketing rape and sexual molestation this mass migration has led to (information about which the Establishment press and European governments have tried mightily to supress, of course). As one modern Moorish wag put it, in explication of his brutal sexual attack upon a ten-year old boy at a German swimming pool, these are "sexual emergencies." Indeed! Like all great "future fiction," Houellebecq's "goofy" satire is fimly rooted in current events and may, as with many of Orwell's and Huxley's once exaggerated and parodic visions, become established as depressingly factual within a few short decades.

[@evelynesimon5758]

love the humour in ur reviews.

[@borisovicinovski]

didn't this woman just ramble on about nothing at all

[@pamcgarvey]

B

[@zacgeoffrion7091]

"There are... many paths which may lead to such happiness as is attainable by men, but there is none which does so for certain. Even religion cannot keep it's promise. If the believer finally sees himself obliged to speak of god's 'inscrutable decrees', he is admitting that all that is left to him as a last possible consolation and source of pleasure in his suffering is an unconditional submission. And if he is prepared for that he probably could have spared himself the detour he has made."

[@ghandi409]

This video is longer than it takes to read the book!

[@zelesluk1]

Isn't it a proof that that's a good book?

[@Gabrielledestrey]

Very poor sound quality - Dommage

[@jerrylewisfan8017]

The old lib guy was angered that the book disrespected the Prophet.

[@teddayer6523]

Houellebecq represents the exact opposite of American culture. He is a stoic who decided not to give a shit. He is our French George Carlin.

[@Blady99]

What is this old guy’s deal?

[@amanieux]

good content but audio sucks, can't you afford one lav microphone per speaker ?

[@DGSE]

Translation please...

[@johngreen2468]

bad audio

[@joostvandegoor150]

I can’t help thinking: Woody Allen could make a hilarious film about these people.

[@Insult2inquiry]

An incredibly boring conversation

[@joemiller7631]

What a waste - why they don's speak to the mic? Aren't these people supposed to be smart?

[@akodenkuniklo6109]

No such country as Palestine. It was a region renamed after an Indo-European group the Phillistines, who have no relation to the Semitic Arab Israelis or "Palestinians".

[@claudiocruzat8777]

. They idolize this guy.. i bought a book in spanish (3novels in one) and finished the first then threw the book into the fireplace. This MH is a vey lucky guy..the most overrated published writer in the last 100 years, period. Never happened to me before. I felt sick.

[@MrMaxSkorpion]

What an awful discussion

[@marcusbeto]

she speaks so far from mic

[@omaralkaaby7045]

When racists meet up

[@loustic59vda]

It is so easy. We don't talk about a race or ethnic group but a religion. It means to talk about the ideology behing islam.