Life: A User's Manual

Adapted from the English Wikipedia article Life: A User's Manual, available under CC BY-SA 4.0Updated 10 August 2025

Life: A User's Manual (originally titled La Vie mode d'emploi) stands as Georges Perec's most celebrated work, released in 1978 and first rendered into English by David Bellos in 1987. Notably described on its cover as "novels" in the plural form, the book’s intricate design is reflected through its interlaced narratives and numerous references. While frequently categorized under postmodern literature, Perec primarily associated himself with the Oulipo group, renowned for employing writing constraints.

The storyline revolves around the inhabitants of a fictional Parisian apartment complex located at 11 rue Simon-Crubellier, with its layered narrative structure enriching the tale’s complexity and depth.

Plot

Taking place during the interwar period, the narrative follows Bartlebooth, an affluent Englishman whose name blends literary allusions. He embarks on an elaborate lifelong endeavor to exhaust his wealth: initially dedicating a decade to mastering watercolor painting under the guidance of Valène, an artist residing in the same building. Subsequently, over two decades, he journeys worldwide accompanied by his servant Smautf, producing 500 watercolor paintings depicting various ports approximately every fortnight.

Upon his return, each artwork is handed over to Gaspard Winckler—also a resident—who converts them into jigsaw puzzles. Bartlebooth then painstakingly reassembles these puzzles, after which Georges Morellet applies a chemical treatment that removes the wooden backing while preserving the paper image. The paintings are then sent back to their original port locations where, exactly twenty years later, a chemical process fades their colors entirely, leaving only subtle outlines of the puzzle cuts.

Despite half a century of dedication, Bartlebooth’s project leaves no tangible legacy. Challenges emerge as Winckler’s puzzles become increasingly complex and Bartlebooth gradually loses his eyesight. An art enthusiast’s intervention compels Bartlebooth to modify his plan by burning the watercolors locally instead of returning them to the sea. By 1975, he falls behind schedule and dies attempting to complete his 439th puzzle—the last missing piece shaped like a W fitting into an X-shaped gap.

Structure

The story is anchored around a single fixed moment—23 June 1975, just before 8 pm—immediately following Bartlebooth’s death. This temporal anchor frames numerous interconnected tales relating to current and former residents of the apartment block. While Bartlebooth’s narrative remains central, it weaves through many other stories.

A notable subplot features painter Serge Valène, whom Bartlebooth employs as his instructor before his voyage; Valène also lives in the same building. His ambition is to paint the entire apartment block with its facade removed, exposing all occupants and their lives—a visual metaphor representing the novel itself. Chapter 51 details Valène’s artistic concept, emphasizing major stories already narrated alongside those yet to unfold.

Both Bartlebooth and Valène ultimately fail to realize their grand designs, highlighting failure as a persistent theme throughout the novel.

Apartment block

Perec’s intense attention to lists reaches its peak in the intricate portrayal of a Parisian apartment building, its facade removed to reveal every interior space. The building located at 11 rue Simon-Crubellier is depicted frozen at the instant of Bartlebooth’s demise, with inhabitants immobilized throughout the apartments, staircases, and cellars; some rooms remain unoccupied.

The storyline unfolds in a pattern reminiscent of a knight’s chess move, dedicating chapters to individual rooms—the greater the number of rooms, the more chapters are created. Each space uncovers narratives about its present or past residents or those linked to them.

Central figures like Smautf, Valène, Winckler, and Morellet are intimately connected to Bartlebooth’s endeavor, pushing that narrative forward. Other tales are related only through their association with the building’s history.

Knight's tour

Drawing inspiration from the Oulipo collective’s idea of organizing writing via a knight's tour, Perec conceptualizes the building as a 10×10 matrix—ten levels including basements and attics, and ten rooms per floor including stairwells. Each chapter corresponds to one room, sequenced according to knight’s moves across this grid. With a total of 99 chapters (one basement room excluded), this structural design echoes Bartlebooth’s theme of failure as reflected in the novel’s construction.

Lists

The novel’s material was derived from 42 distinct lists, each containing 10 items (such as the "Fabrics" list). Perec utilized Graeco-Latin squares, or "bi-squares," to allocate these elements throughout the 99 chapters. A bi-square, more intricate than sudoku, arranges two sets of elements so that every row and column includes each item exactly once. Perec devised 21 bi-squares, each pairing two 10-item lists, allowing all 42 lists to be distributed across chapters. Every cell on the apartment layout corresponded with cells on each bi-square, generating a unique combination of 42 elements per chapter.

Lists numbered 39 and 40 ("Gap" and "Wrong") feature numbers from 1 to 10; referencing the "Wrong" bi-square would impose intentional mistakes in selecting certain fabrics, colors, accessories, or jewels assigned by other bi-squares within that chapter.

To add further intricacy to plot generation, Perec grouped 40 lists into ten sets of four (for instance, the sixth set includes "Fabrics," "Colours," "Accessories," and "Jewels").

Lists 39 and 40 also applied self-referential constraints within their own subgroup. As noted by Perec’s biographer David Bellos, this allowed for meta-constraints like "gapping the gap" or "wronging the wrong," introducing layered variations in how rules were enforced. The final two lists (41 and 42) form ten pairs (such as "Pride & Prejudice" and "Laurel & Hardy") that were exempt from these manipulations. Perec observed that these lists often served as creative prompts; some chapters contain fewer than all 42 elements.

Appendix

The appendix features a timeline beginning in 1833, an extensive index spanning seventy pages, a compilation of roughly one hundred principal stories, and a 10×10 grid diagram illustrating the block’s elevation. The index encompasses people, locations, and artworks referenced throughout the book, including:

historical figures like Mozart
fictional characters such as Jules Verne's Captain Nemo
internally real personas like Bartlebooth
internally fictitious individuals from narratives embedded within the story

Reception

In The New York Times Book Review, author Paul Auster commended Georges Perec, pointing out that despite Perec’s death in 1982 at the age of 46, his seminal novel – Life: A User's Manual (1978) – has profoundly influenced modern French literature. Auster described Perec as "one of the most unique literary figures worldwide," underlining the enduring significance of his translated works for readers around the world.

References