Surplus Matter

The narrator’s form of therapy, in other words, is nostalgia, a way to reach back to a time when his life still felt whole and authentic. Yet as the narrator grows more and more obsessed with living only in these flawless moments, Remainder suggests that our fixation with authenticity may be itself a trauma. It describes the truth of representations and stars a man who erects his memories as gigantic art pieces and finds himself frustrated by how simulations can only stand-in for reality.

Ken Chen reviews Remainder in Rain Taxi.

In its brutal excision of psychology it is easy to feel that Remainder comes to literature as an assassin, to kill the novel stone dead. I think it means rather to shake the novel out of its present complacency. It clears away a little of the dead wood, offering a glimpse of an alternate road down which the novel might, with difficulty, travel forward. We could call this constructive deconstruction, a quality that, for me, marks Remainder as one of the great English novels of the past ten years.

Zadie Smith reviews Remainder in the New York Review of Books.

In the same way that Robbe-Grillet’s Jealousy tells its story through architecture in book form, Remainder is an art installation disguised as a brilliant novel.

Tom McCarthy’s Remainder receives The Believer’s fourth annual Book Award.

Typically, Remainder’s unconventional character is expressed principally through its form, a narrativeless, first person affair where little happens in standard terms. There are no problems or solutions as such, just ideas to be explored indefinitely.

Remainder reviewed in new blog Slates.

I’m interested in people’s readings of the books. A novel doesn’t end when it’s written; in a way, that’s just the beginning: the ‘meaning’ isn’t enclosed within it but emerges from its meeting with other texts, other moments — all textbook deconstruction stuff, I know, but no less true for that. Having said that, some readings are much more productive than others. Ones that interpret Remainder, for example, as a straight allegory or ‘solve’ it by suggesting that the hero’s dead but doesn’t know it yet are interesting but limited. The critic Andrew Gibson, who’s just put out a book on Beckett and Badiou, told me that my work is about ‘the radical death of the world,’ adding that this is the theme of twenty-first century philosophy. I’m not sure I understand what he means but it sounds really good.

Mark Thwaite interviews Tom McCarthy in ReadySteadyBook.

Remainder is a deeply philosophical novel of the best kind — the kind without any philosophy in it.

Antoine Wilson on philosophy and physiotherapy in Remainder.

Remainder is “different and compelling, and definitely worth discussing”.

“Rebuilding of life forgotten is a story to remember.”

“Remainder is the kind of book that will make you giggle at its witty and meticulous descriptions, impress you with its near-perfect prose and leave you scratching your head.”

“A great answer to the question: What would you do if you had a million dollars?”