W, or the Memory of Childhood

Georges Perec · 1936–1982 · France

Originally W ou le souvenir d'enfance (French) · translated by David Bellos

Why it matters

Alternating chapters of a sinister sports-obsessed island fable and fragmentary memories of a Jewish childhood during the Occupation slowly reveal themselves as the same story. Perec's most personal and devastating book.

At a glance

Two alternating narratives whose connection is withheld until late.