Tosh Berman on Tony Duvert's "District" & "Odd Jobs" (Wakefield Press)

 

Tosh on Tony Duvert's "District" & Odd Jobs" (Wakefield Press)

"Odd Jobs" by Tony Duvert (Wakefield Press)

ISBN: 978-1-939663-29-0 Wakefield Press

Jonathan Swift comes to mind while reading Tony Deuvert's "Odd Jobs."  The set of stories takes place in a village, and all focus on particular occupations that are held in this village.  Or is it even the same village?  Nevertheless, there are occupations such as 'the snot-remover,' 'the wiper' (he cleans your ass and collects your poop) and 'the fondler' who skillfully jerks off boys, and so forth.  I imagine if you try to locate this specific village it may be difficult.  Therefore we're lucky that we have Tony Duvert to lead us to a world, of his own making, and beyond that, a savage satire on family culture and practices. Duvert is a writer who is very sensitive to the concept of family, and how cruel that system can be on individuals and more likely children.  A controversial writer in France, the late Duvert reminds me of Fassbinder the filmmaker, in that he too attacked systems that eventually oppressed a class or the public.  A social commentator, as well as a very dark humorist, "Odd Jobs" is a remarkable piece of work. Like his "District" (also published by Wakefield Press)  this book is a fantastic (although not necessarily) companion to "Odd Jobs."

"District" by Tony Duvert (Wakefield Press)

ISBN: 978-1-939663-30-6 Wakefield Press

Like the iconic and cliche saying about peeling an onion and each layer has a separate meaning or taste, so does the work of Tony Duvert.  "District" is a 40-page book, with ten sections/chapters and an introduction by the translators S. C. Delaney and Agnès Potier.   While reading the book this early afternoon, I immediately thought of the text that went along with the photos of 

Eugène Atget, who took early images of Paris and its life before Paris become modernized in the late 19th century.  Duvert covers an unnamed city (one can presume it's Paris, but who knows?) and in detail writes about that area in a poetic view or prose.  One gets the impression that he's a loner observing life as it happens, but not participating in what goes on in front of him.   It's a gem of a small book that leaves a large impression on me.  I have always been fascinated with writing that deals with a specific space, such as in various writers who were part of, or influenced by Situationists.  Duvert's "District" can follow that direction of such groupings, but also a touch of the "nouveau roman."

"The Undiscoverable Reading" an essay by Tony Duvert

ISBN 978-1-58435-135-1 Semiotext[e]

"The Undiscoverable Reading" an essay by Tony Duvert (Translated by Bruce Benderson) with drawings by  Eli Langer (Semiotext[e])

Tony Duvert is a very hard sale. Due to the fact that he has an interest in pedophilia and criticized modern child-rearing. In the 70s, due to the sexual moral times of that era, he could get his work published, but since the 1980s he was pretty much ignored by the mainstream press and even from the Underground.  Which is a shame, because Duvert is a very interesting writer and thinker.  Semiotext[e] the brilliant press are the only one's that are publishing his work, and the booklet I have just read, "The Undisoverable Reading" is hard-to-find.  It's a 40 page chapbook, with no bind, but I read it twice, because I found it to be difficult and enticing at the same time.   In this essay, Duvert writes about the nature of literature and how reader's perceive literature - both as someone who may write books, as well as its readers.  The reader in a sense, meets the author.  He starts off writing about an ad selling classic literature to a normal family, and gives a funny picture of that type of ad- and then he goes into the advertisement of a company selling a service in 'how to write,' and gives a picture there of a young girl about to start her novel or some sort of creative writing.  From there, he digs into the deeper world of why people read, but also the nature of avant-garde literature when it mixes with the mainstream world of books.   The writing is very dense and one has to concentrate - but as I said, I was compelled to read it twice in a row - and each read was enjoyable experience.   This work was part of the Semiotext[e] box set that was sold at the Whitney.  I think the whole collection is sold out, but I think for sure, worth the trouble to locate this box of chapbooks.   As a brand, you can pretty much trust the Semiotext[e] publishing house to always, or at the very least, put out interesting titles.  

- Tosh Berman

Tony Duvert's "Diary of an innocent"

Diary of an Innocent by Tony Duvert

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


I first heard the name Tony Duvert on Dennis Cooper's great (and on going) blog, and was intrigued that he was a French writer (my obsession) and wrote about sexuality that many will feel questionable. "Diary of an Innocent" reads like a sex diary, rant, social theory, and a feverish dream all at once. The back cover liner notes says 'novel' but I wonder if it is - but that's not the issue of the book. What the book is about is a man who enjoys gay sex with various young boys in what may be somewhere in North Africa. It is also a social critique on the nature of passion and how it plays itself out in the 'mainstream' world.



Towards the end of the book he writes about heterosexuality as an outlaw fringe group lurking in the shadows of homosexual world that is both funny and quite insightful in how structure rules the world. In another one of his books (which I haven't read) "Good Sex Illustrated" he attacks the fact that a child's sex is conditioned and controlled by the structure of family and state - and are taught not to for fulfil their sexuality or desires. So through the eyes of Duvert, Western sexuality is part of a system that these kids are pooped out to fill out a role that family, state, and whoever wants to control.



"Diary of an Innocent" is a complex and very frank book about sexuality and how that plays out in a very constructed culture and society



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