An Attempt at Exhausting a Place - Alex English

In my previous blog post I wrote about Lynda Barry’s simple template for listing the details of the day with her Daily Diary.

Now I’d like to introduce you to Georges Perec – a French novelist and filmmaker and member of the Oulipo group of writers, famed for their constrained writing (Perec famously wrote a novel consisting only of words that don’t contain the letter ‘e’).

In 1974, frustrated with newspapers’ focus on disasters and sensationalist stories (which rings very true with me at the moment – I almost cannot bear to read the news), Perec decided to shift his focus to the ordinary mundanities of life.

“The papers annoy me, they teach me nothing.” 

Georges Perec 

The result was a short (40 pages!) book titled An Attempt at Exhausting a Place in Paris, published in 1975. It consists solely of lists of every detail of ‘mundane life’ that Perec observed while sitting in a cafe on Place Saint-Sulpice in Paris for three days.

There's something rather beautiful and hypnotic in these simple lists, and it's something I've tried to get into the habit of doing whenever I have a spare moment.

The numbers in Perec's notes refer to buses.

Refreshments are allowed!

'Exhausting a place' is something I now do whenever I'm not sure what to write. There's no expectation of a finished piece, just an exercise in noting down details. And I do happen to live in Paris at the moment, but it doesn't have to be a glamorous-sounding location. Anywhere can be exhausted, all it require is pen, paper and (most importantly) your attention.

As a side note, during my research into Georges Perec, I happened upon this rather lovely short film An Attempt at Exhausting a Place in Sussex by Jessica Bishopp, inspired by Perec’s book.

I also came across this intriguing creative writing workshop, An Attempt at Exhausting a Place in Leicester, on Tuesday 16 July.

Have you ever tried 'exhausting a place'?

Alex English is a graduate of Bath Spa University's MA Writing for Young People. Her picture books Yuck said the Yak, Pirates Don't Drive Diggers and Mine Mine Mine said the Porcupine are published by Maverick Arts Publishing and she has more forthcoming from Bloomsbury and Faber & Faber.
www.alexenglish.co.uk