A Void

Whenever I'm reading Perec's A Void, I am constantly distracted by the lists that he is always using. Every sentence is so long because he adds these lists so by the time I get to the period, I have to reread the sentence to understand what he means. Even as I get to the end of the novel, I can't help but be distracted by it. The worst is when he just keeps throwing in random new names of people that never come up again. In my creative short story writing class, we learned not to use too many names because they just create red herrings. As I read the novel I'm constantly wondering, 'do I need to remember this name?'

Today in class we talked about inspiration and it got me thinking, why did Perec decide to make a novel without the letter E? What did he want to accomplish by doing this? Did it just sound like a fun creative idea? Personally, I think Perec could have made a better novel if he would have used the letter E. Maybe then he wouldn't have used so many distracting list or confusing names. Then again, with the letter E, he wouldn't be able to add so many creative analogies such as the 5th volume missing or the man Vowl missing.