The Address by Sophie Calle - Book Report/Review Example

Said one critic of Sophie Calle’s short book en d, The Address Book, “Calle conflates fact with fiction” (Jovanovic In seeking to answer this charge, the following analysis will focus upon what Calle specifically was intending to get across to the reader and the way in which “fact” and “fiction” can be defined as in terms of understanding Calle’s vantage point. Is the hope of this author that such a level of analysis will be able to provide a firm understanding to the reader of whether or not this author agrees or disagrees with the prior quote which was provided from the critic Rozalia Jovanovic in “The Gallerist”.

Firstly, it must be stated that I strongly agree with the notion that Sophie Calle has merely cobbled together unrelated points of fact and fiction within her work. However, rather than this ultimately detracting from the point that she is trying to make, it helps to reinforce an understanding of Pierre D and the way through which other individuals understood, appreciated, hate it, trusted, love, or despised him. In such a way, instead of being clueless with regards to the fact that she was presenting both fact and fiction, Calle likely understood that a presentation of fact and fiction was required to create an image of an individual that she had not yet met.

In creating this image, Calle helps the reader to understand that all human judgment is ultimately subjective; bounded to the determinants of personal taste, first impressions, and bias. In this way, seeking to denote something as “fiction” does not in and of itself make it untrue. Although this may be somewhat confusing, what is meant by such a statement is the fact that even a fictitious interpretation, a fictitious love, a fictitious desire, a fictitious hate, a fictitious dislike; all of these fictitious feelings are ultimately true in the subjective sense with regards to the way in which a given individual feels about another.

Naturally, the “true statements” that Calle presents are nuanced to due to the fact that they are proven “true by the large number of individuals that integrate with an appreciation for them. Within the current world, and outside of an interpretation of Calle’s book, it can be readily noted that decisions, subjective judgments, likes, dislikes, and a range of other feelings and emotions all back to the way in which individual judgment with respect to whether they like or dislike a given individual.

In seeking to point to this fact, it is a matter of necessity that the author in question mixes both fact and fiction. In other words, rather than the critics comment concerning the fact that she was mixing the two as being a derogatory and/or inflammatory statement, it can instead be inferred to have a rather positive connotation with respect to the way in which human beings understand and make judgments concerning key topics of like, dislike and interpersonal relations. At its core, the novel approaches a rather interesting understanding of relativity.

What is meant by this is the fact that instead of understanding facts as being something verifiable and proven with regards to an exhaustive study – something necessarily having a positive connotation, and fiction something that is merely a figment of the imagination – something that is only evidenced within the mind and/or the imagination of a given individual, the author points to the fact that these two terms are ultimately inseparable. Rather than stating that all things are equal and there is no truth or that there is no fiction, Calle is able to point to the fact that human beings necessarily create a reality all their own; conflating fact and fiction as a function of their everyday life.

In helping to point to this duality, Calle is able to represent a universal truth with regards to how human emotions and thoughts take shape and are represented. Within such an understanding and interpretation, the reader can come to the appreciation for the fact that the “fact and fiction” that Calle mixes is in fact of little consequence. The larger issue of consequence is whether or not this fact or this fiction relates to the way in which understanding is formed. One does not seek to ask the question of truth or falsehood when it comes to answering why a specific action took place.

In the same way, seeking to answer whether her formulations of human thought and like/dislike were formulated on fact or fiction, and seeking to make a value judgment from this, is useless. Works Cited Calle, Sophie, and Pauline Baggio. The address book. Los Angeles: Siglio, 2012. Print. Jovanovic, Rozalia. "Sophie Calle’s Controversial ‘Address Book’ Will Be Published as a Book for the First Time." Gallerist. N.p., 12 Apr. 2011. Web. 25 Sept. 2013.