Book. Michel Houellebecq, Sylvain Tesson and Yann Moix, each of these authors rewrote, in their own way, The stolen letter (1844), by Edgar Allan Poe. Fashionable writers, they have cultivated connections with the extreme right. These facts are known, but, in the public debate, a form of modesty persists before mentioning them. In a breathless investigation, François Krug lifts the veil on these relationships. A freelance journalist, he regularly contributes to the Monde and “M Le magazine du Monde”.
It is about Sylvain Tesson that François Krug teaches us the most. His story On the dark paths (Gallimard, 2016) has just been adapted for the cinema with Jean Dujardin in the leading role. Success allowed Sylvain Tesson to perfect his character as a backpacking writer, using his bohemianism to curse modernity. He follows in the footsteps of Jean Raspail, also a lover of travel and author of camp of the saints (Robert Laffont, 1973), a novel imagining a France invaded by a horde of immigrants. From his first trip in 1993 until Raspail’s death, Tesson corresponded with him. He was also close to Dominique Venner, father of the post-war extreme right.
François Krug demonstrates, moreover, that the program “A summer with Homer”, hosted by Sylvain Tesson, on France Inter, in 2017, offered an interpretation ofIliad and of theOdyssey strangely close to that developed by Venner and marked by a deep anti-Enlightenment sentiment.
For his part, Michel Houellebecq has long supported the careers of young shoots of ultra-right journalism and literature. Geoffroy Lejeune arrives as editorial director of Current values when he was not yet 30 years old, and very quickly he received the support of Houellebecq. In 2010, the Goncourt won by the novelist for The Map and the Territory (Flammarion, 2010) opened the doors of the Elysée to him. Michel Houellebecq responds to Nicolas Sarkozy’s invitation to dinner, going to the presidential palace accompanied by the hosts of a former site of the fachosphere (Sur le ring), David Kersan and Laurent Obertone – author of Clockwork Orange France (Ring, 2013), an essay denouncing the alleged “wildness” of our country.
Grim Consistency
In 1996, Sébastien Lapaque and Luc Richard, young members of Action Française, were seduced by the antiliberal poetry of Michel Houellebecq and conducted an interview with him for Immediately, the monarchist journal they had just created. Michel Houellebecq continues to attend Action Française: in 2022, he answered questions from young Maurassians during an interview conducted in front of the public.
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