Laurent Binet. The 7th Function of Language (Londres: Harvill Secker, 2017). 390 pages. Translated from the French by Sam Taylor.
Should I say I was lucky to study and read Roland Barthes
at university? I believe so. I remember enjoying his Mythologies and
wondering about what other product-signs we should be demythologising and
deconstructing, yet at the time, most nights I would go out and I sort of ended
up being interested in, well, different things.
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| Sort of a myth himself now, isn't he? Young Roland Barthes, Photograph by Fragolaleone |
Barthes died in an accident in the streets of Paris.
He was knocked down by a laundry van in late February 1980, and passed away a
month later. I certainly found his work inspirational, and we could well ask ourselves
what, were he still alive, he would be making of contemporary signs such as the
bitten-off apple of the software and hardware giant or the M-shaped arches of
the multinational you-want-fries-with-your-burger? company that has been
clogging the arteries of millions of people all over the world for years.
Binet takes the fact of Barthes’ accident and makes it
into a fictional murder. But why would a semiotician be murdered? Because he
had with him the only copy of a text authored by Russian linguist Roman
Jakobson. Allegedly, this text would identify the seventh function of language,
which would be a magical performative function giving its possessor the power
to make people do things. Something every politician might kill for, of course.
In a parody of detective novels, thrillers and
similar, Binet constructs a big metafictional joke. The policeman in charge of
the investigation into Barthes’ death, Bayard, starts by interviewing Foucault
about semiotics and semiology. He understands fuck-all, obviously, so he tries
to read Barthes and others, which angers him even more, and so he will seek the
aid of a lecturer on semiotics: enter Simon Herzog, who impresses Bayard by
revealing his background and most of his personality traits by simply looking
at him and his clothes.
What happens next (and the above is just the beginning
of this bizarre, hilarious and crazy fiction) is a long story. The unlikely duo
are partnered in the pursuit of the mysterious document in a journey that takes
them from Paris to Bologna, where they witness political vendettas, are allowed
entrance to a secret Logos Club in which orators and debaters engage in
rhetorical duels, with the loser getting a finger chopped off when defeated,
and miraculously escape the bombing of the railway station.
They next travel to a big conference at Cornell
University, in Ithaca, NY. Their stay is punctuated by various strange
episodes, amongst them the death of Jacques Derrida, savagely killed by dogs while a girl named Cordelia was giving him a blowjob.
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| No, Derrida did not die here. Binet chooses to kill him at Cornell, but only in fiction. Photograph by Laurenvhs. |
The final part takes them to Venice. More Logos Club
challenges, more chopped fingers (and other body parts, too!) street skirmishes
and kidnappings. Outlandish events and conversations are too numerous to recap;
characters come and go without rhyme or reason. And after winning his oratorial
challenge at the Club, Simon is made to pay a huge price.
With The 7th Function
of Language, Binet enjoys himself a lot, and if you are game to take a
refreshingly quick dip into the theory of semiotics, linguistics and
metafiction, this is a novel that will make you laugh out loud. The list of
real people Binet makes irreverent use of is inexhaustible: from Umberto Eco to
Julia Kristeva, from Michel Foucault to Noam Chomsky, from Bjorn Borg to Vitas
Gerulaitis. Presidents such as Giscard d’Estaing and Mitterrand, prime
ministers such as Laurent Fabius, and a noticeably young Afro-American
politician named Barack Obama.
There is comedy, there is
Hollywood-style action, car chases, sex, hot steamy baths where old men and
young gigolos meet. There are also puns, play on words and names, a constant
game played between fact and fiction in which Binet deliberately shows his hand
by using the first person, a bold interference in the narrative that not always
pays dividends.
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| The volcano crater of Pozzuoli near Naples is where Simon exacts his revenge. What a scenic spot to finish the novel! Photograph by I. Shevtsov. |
The 7th
Function of Language
is a delicious parody, yet to me it felt more like fanciful, delightfully
absurd and exhilarating entertainment than a thriller. The plot is far more
sophisticated than any bestseller might ever dream of; yet underlying the
playful, the profane, and the mocking the novel does offer aplenty there is
also a deeply felt homage to the sciences of language and a clever invention
from historical materials. And I’d bet my little finger that Barthes would have
given Binet his tick of approval.
