Hubert Aquin Archives | Numéro Cinq

“There is only one possible law of style: write to the maximum of intensity and incantation.” That’s Hubert Aquin, from his 1968 novel Trou de Mémoire (Blackout in the English translation). It’s the only rule you need for writing and for life. And the novel itself is astonishing for its combination of obsession and rupture.

I wrote an essay about Aquin, “Difficulty and Revolution,” which is in my essay book Notes Home from a Prodigal Son, but you can also read it online in Dalkey Archive’s magazine Context.

And here is a Jacques Godbout documentary about Aquin; Godbout, an eminent novelist and filmmaker, published two of my books in French in his capacity as editor of éditions du Boréal in Montreal (Les Pas de L’ourse and Seize sortes de désir)

Two Episodes from the Life of Hubert Aquin by Jacques Godbout, National Film Board of Canadaé

Hubert Aquin

Here is an essay of mine from my book Notes Home from a Prodigal Son, also published in Dalkey Archive’s magazine Context, which you can find at the link below. It used to be online but then disappeared when Dalkey reorganized its website. Now it’s back. The late, great French-Canadian novelist Hubert Aquin was a huge influence on me: he was a pyrotechnic genius, a black romantic, a revolutionary spirit and a suicide. He burned hard and bright. Nothing like him anywhere else.

1. Why are some novels more difficult to read than other novels? Why do some authors choose to write difficult books when they could just as easily write so-called well-made books, books that would presumably have a better chance of achieving a wide audience and commercial success? If writing a book, like speaking, is a form of communication, then doesn’t difficulty rather defeat the purpose of writing at all? What is the difference between a difficult book and a well-made book? And how do they both relate to the not-writing of a book, to unwriting, to silence?

Read the rest at Difficulty and Revolution | Dalkey Archive Press.