AZADE
Opening reception 28/08
Raymond Queneau
Zazie dans le métro
Gallimard 1959
Novel
Softcover, 256 p.
12 × 19 cm
Texts in French
First edition
Behind the apparent lightness of this burlesque and irreverent tale lies a work of great formal and intellectual richness, questioning language, reality and the very nature of literature. Raymond Queneau deconstructs the traditional boundaries of the novel. Part reverse coming-of-age novel, part urban adventure story, part social satire and part linguistic experiment, Zazie dans le métro constantly plays with literary conventions. The narrative framework—that of a young girl from the provinces, Zazie, visiting her uncle Gabriel in Paris—serves as a pretext for an anarchic stroll through a fantastical city. The metro, whose absence becomes an ironic leitmotif, is less a setting than a symbol: that of a modern world where landmarks are disappearing and meaning is breaking down, mirroring the language of the novel itself.
This second-hand publication bears small traces of its previous life.
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