Whatever

Michel Houellebecq's first novel, published in 1994, contains in embryo some of the themes developed more fully in his later books. There is extravagant pessimism, a critique of trash culture, and an argument that sexual liberalization has had the same result as economic liberalization: mass pauperization. How far the author has traveled since this debut is an open question, but he is a guide whom astute readers will happily follow over the same ground again and again.