Ever since debut Whatever (1994) ushered in a new breed of literary ‘depressionism’ Michel Houellebecq has polarised the critics. In a twenty-year career that has seen him become the most internationally successful French writer since Albert Camus, Houellebecq has been dogged by accusations of Islamophobia, misogyny, nihilism, and yet he endures. So just what it is about this so-called agent provocateur that appeals to so many? Sensationalism? A subversive form of peaceful protest for readers tired of the status quo, or is it something simpler?
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