The Elegance of the Hedgehog by Muriel Barbery

Can I say that I even like running my hands over the powder blue cover of this book, sensing its texture with my fingers while I reflect on the latest "Profound Thought" from Paloma or overwrought effort by Renée to hide her true nature?

In one passage, the concierge Renée describes another character's words as 'delectable' but resists the urge to engage in a conversation with the man lest the truth slip out. As far as her description of words as "delectable," I feel similarly about Barbery's words--from Paloma's essays on the beauty of grammar and language to the concierge's elegant justification for journal writing, for example:

"Freed from the demands of decision and intention, adrift on some inner sea, we observe our various movements as if they belonged to someone else, and yet we admire their involuntary excellence. What other reason might I have for writing this--ridiculous journal of an aging concierge--if the writing did not have something of the art of scything about it? The lines gradually become their own demiurges and, like some witless yet miraculous participant, I witness the birth on paper of sentences that have eluded my will and appear in spite of me on the sheet, teaching me something that I neither knew nor thought I might want to know. This painless birth, like an unsolicited proof, gives me untold pleasure, and with neither toil nor certainty but the joy of frank astonishment I follow the pen that is guiding and supporting me." (p. 123)

Um, so yeah...I can totally relate to that. 

And the words Barbery uses! They're so far outside of my lexicon. Still I can't help but giggle with joy at the offense she takes at grammatical improprieties--certainly I too am guilty some grammatical errors right here in this entry, but I love it nonetheless when a misplaced comma in a note from a supposedly learned tenant causes such consternation to Renée that she swoons and has to take a seat to calm herself.

Here's an excerpt from Paloma's "Profound Thought No. 14," an observation she makes after 1) glimpsing a television show about kids burning cars and wondering what makes them do it; and 2) meeting a wealthy French mother who has adopted a young Thai boy:     

"Then suddenly I say to myself, Théo might want to burn cars some day. Because it's a gesture of frustration and anger, and maybe the greatest anger and frustration come not from unemployment or poverty or the lack of a future but from the feeling that you have no culture, because you've been torn between cultures, between incompatible symbols. How can you exist if you don't know where you are? What do you do if your culture will always be that of a Thai fishing village and of Parisian grands bourgeouis at the same time? Or if you're the son of immigrants but also the citizen of an old, conservative nation? So you burn cars, because when you have no culture, you're no longer a civilized animal, you're a wild beast. And a wild beast burns and kills and pillages." (p. 257)

I like this quote for two reasons--for me, it gives a good rationale for some instances of seemingly insane and despicable acts that people commit; and it touches on the cultural complexity of being from two lands but not fully a part of either one--a conflict that my character America feels in the Mama Lilia story I am writing.

Anyway, in summary, profound thoughts draped in eloquent language abound in The Elegance of the Hedgehog. My take on this book is that it is ultimately a story about friendship, for in the end both Renée and Paloma develop unlikely friendships that help them to rise above their intellectual isolation and find new meaning in life. I won't give away the ending, but I will say that it surprised me. 

Elegance of the Hedgehog is the winner of several prominent French literary prizes. The  English translation, reviewed briefly here, is a New York Times bestseller. Thanks to Cathy for loaning me this book!