The death of God in the West was the prelude to a formidable metaphysical soap opera that continues to this day. Christianitys masterstroke was to combine a fierce belief in the individual with the promise of eternal participation in the Absolute. When that dream evaporated, various attempts were made to offer the individual a minimum of being. The latest of these attempts is advertising, which seeks to arouse desire and transform the subject into a docile phantom doomed to follow advertisings every whim. But, like all previous attempts, this skin-deep, superficial participation in the world fails, and unhappiness and depression continue to spread.

However, we can all produce a cold revolution in ourselves by stepping outside the flow of information and advertising. We need to take some time out, unplug the television, turn off our iPhones, stop buying stuff, stop wanting to buy stuff, temporarily detach ourselves and adopt an aesthetic attitude to the world. We just need to stay still for a few seconds.

This is one of the key themes developed by Michel Houellebecq in this collection of his texts and interviews from the last three decades. Here he explains and elaborates his point of view, discusses his novels and addresses a wide range of topics from politics, religion and literature to suicide, euthanasia and paedophilia. An indispensable book for anyone interested in the work of one of the most widely read and controversial novelists of our time.

Michel Houellebecq is a French writer, poet and essayist.  His many bestselling books includePlatform,The Possibility of an Island,Submission andSerotonin.  He won the prestigious Prix Goncourt in 2010 and, in 2019, he was awarded the Légion dhonneur, Frances highest order of merit.

1.  Jacques Prévert is a jerk

2.  The Mirage by Jean-Claude Guiguet

3. Approaches to distress

4. Staring into the distance: in praise of silent cinema

5. Interview with Jean-Yves Jouannais and Christophe Duchâtel

6. Art as peeling

7. Creative absurdity

8. The party

9. Time out

10. Opera bianca

11. Letter to Lakis Proguidis

12. The question of paedophilia

13. Humanity, the second stage

14. Empty heavens

15. I have a dream

16. Neil Young

17. Interview with Christian Authier

18. I dont love myself

19. Sky, earth, sun

20. Leaving the twentieth century

21. Philippe Muray in 2002

22. Towards a semi-rehabilitation of the hick

23. Conservatism, a source of progress

24. Prolegomena to positivism

25. Im normal. A normal writer

26. I have read my whole life long

27. Soil cutting

28. The lost text

29. Interview with Frédéric Beigbeder

30. A remedy for the exhaustion of being

31. Interview with Marin De Viry and Valérie Toranian

32. Interview with Agathe Novak-Lechevalier

33. Emmanuel Carrère and the problem of goodness

34. Donald Trump is a good president

35. Conversation with Geoffroy Lejeune

36. A bit worse. A response to a few friends

37. The Vincent Lambert affair should not have taken place