Edouard Louis: History of Violence

Grimly remarkable. Essentially a first person narration...sort of...where the narrator describes a gay pickup which turns into rape and assault. The actual assault is almost and mercifully, only glancingly described and the main focus is the narrator replaying in his mind everything that led up to the assault and the bureaucratic aftermath as he painfully goes over all that happened. I indicated a ‘sort of’ first person narration as he describes to us overheating his sister tell her husband about the event...something that he obviously did directly and earlier. An interesting distancing technique and he occasionally queries or contradicts what she says sometimes as he is unsure of what he said.

The power of this novel lies in the almost inconceivable effect that the rape has had...and while involving gay men I felt/believed that the reflective experiences were probably universal with an event of this nature. It would be interesting to have responses to this book from survivors of male and female rape.

The sense of bafflement at the event was one of the most powerful aspects of this narration and the traumatic effect it had on the victim , in the days immediately following, as they tried to continue, vainly, with getting back to normality.

Also and deeply disturbing, was the sense of self-blame that permeated the aftermath of the victims life.

Not an enjoyable read but powerful and eye-opening about something that one hopes will never happen to oneself.