PEREC, Georges

Perhaps the most ambitious experimental French writer of his generation, Perec began as an author of crossword puzzles, which perhaps accounts for why few writers, ever, could match his dexterity with innovative linguistic structures. A major member of Oulipo, he wrote many books, including La Disparition (1969), a novel totally devoid of the most popular letter in both English and French—the E—only to discover that the stunt had been done years before, with less literary distinction, by the American...