Stencil and Bartlebooth

[RICHARD ROMEO]

I've just run through a second reading of Perec's Life A User's Manual 
focusing on the character of Bartlebooth, an eminent British exile living 
in Paris who decides to spend the last forty years of his life, taking 20 
years to  reconstruct 500 watercolors that he has painted for 20 years 
around the world which have been turned into puzzles by his friend, a 
certain puzzler with revenge on his mind.  Bartlebooth tries to 
reconstruct these puzzles by apparently creating his own patterns, but 
only at the end of his life does he realize that his reconstruction of 
his own creations is faulty, thanks to the puzzler who through sheer 
genius has planted the wrong clues with the right ones, so as to allow 
Bartlebooth to be able construct those patterns in another form without 
making him aware that he is remolding what he thought he had created.

Now Stencil does try to make sense of all that randomness, in effect, 
establishing his own patterns in his search for V, beneath all that he 
sees.  

Both are frustrated:  bartlebooth by his puzzler and Stencil apparently 
by fear of completing his search.  I guess my point is that the ultimate 
puzzler is someone or thing that is might clever or mighty scary, or 
probably both.  What could be worse, no more puzzles?  A horrid 
thought...

Is Stencil afraid that at the end of the search for V. he will realize he 
was wrong from the beginning, as Bartlebooth discovered?



P.S.  I hope to join the V. reading group--I haven't read V. in a while 
and Perec piqued my interest and besides I can probably learn something 
the second go around.  where are you guys up to?--I'll try to catch up 
over the weekend...



Richard Romeo

Coordinator of Cooperating Collections

The Foundation Center-NYC

212-807-2417

rromeo at fdncenter.org