ABSTRACT
Michel Houellebecq has often been designated as “our great contemporary,” and his works have been cited as among those that offer the most accurate representation of our time. This is quite paradoxical, however, since Michel Houellebecq’s work sometimes seems to adopt the point of view of an aged man, out of place in the modern world. Very few characters are elderly in Houellebecq’s novels: it seems as if the traditional representation of a serene old age has become definitively outdated, and as if old age itself, being incompatible with the modern injunctions to youth and productivity, has had to disappear. Nevertheless, the feeling of being old is almost universally shared by Houellebecq’s characters; he revives the romantic tradition by expressing a deep conflict with modernity. Moreover, an analysis of the few elderly characters appearing in his works suggests that they represent all the values that are currently fading away. In this, the writer’s ambition to save what is on the brink of disappearing is revealed. In doing so, Houellebecq claims that he is untimely – but, according to Nietzsche or to Agamben, this is actually the best way to be a true contemporary.
