Narrative
Exercises in Style
Exercices de style
Raymond Queneau · 1947
Synopsis
On a bus of the S line, a young man with a long neck, wearing a soft hat with a cord around it, quarrels with a passenger who jostles him, then throws himself onto a free seat. A few hours later, in front of the Saint-Lazare station, a friend advises him to have a button added to his overcoat. The anecdote takes up a few lines, and the book tells it ninety-nine times, each time in a different style.
Context
The book appeared with Gallimard in 1947. At first received with reservation, it found its audience through the stage: Yves Robert staged it in 1949 at the Rose rouge cabaret with the Frères Jacques, who then made a record of it. Each version retells the same tiny story, and only the manner changes, from one text to the next, which makes the collection a laboratory of the forms of language. The book has since been adapted in many countries and in many forms.
Who it is for
About a hundred very short texts, independent of one another, which can be read in whatever order one likes.
Prizes and reception
Translated into English by Barbara Wright in 1958 under the title Exercises in Style, it was reissued and expanded in 2013 by New Directions.