Free Republic

Michel Houellebecq is a sardonic and iconoclastic French novelist, winner of the prestigious Prix Goncourt, and subject of considerable controversy in Europe these days. He deserves to be controversial here in the United States as well. He calls his most recent novel a work of "political fiction." Titled "Soumission" (in English, "Submission," in Arabic, an accurate translation would be "Islam"), it is set in the near future, in France, "a Western civilization now ending before our very eyes." Coincidence No. 1: "Soumission" was published in France the same week jihadis attacked the offices of Charlie Hebdo, slaughtering as many members...

Publication day is a proud moment for most authors but it turned into a nightmare for Michel Houellebecq. The French writer’s sixth novel, “Submission,” which will be published in the U.S. next month, had been heralded as his most topical. The book imagines France in 2022 under the rule of an Islamic political party headed by a Muslim president. On Jan. 7, the day “Submission” came out in France, the satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo ran a caricature of the author on its cover. Bleary-eyed and sporting a wizard’s hat, the novelist was portrayed as a lugubrious prophet spouting asides like...

Michel Houellebecq, who first stirred controversy with sex novel Atomised, makes waves with book describing country after Islamist becomes president. Put France’s literary enfant terrible together with Europe’s most combustible political talking point, and sparks were always going to fly. Michel Houellebecq, whose tale of sex, mother-hatred and cloning Atomised was the French literary scandal of the Nineties, is turning his attention to “Islamisation”. His new novel Soumission (Submission), will not be published until January 7 but has already triggered a flurry of accusations that he is pandering to the growing Islamophobia gripping France. It is set in 2022 and...