A man shaves off the moustache he has worn for years, expecting mild surprise from his wife and friends. Instead, nobody reacts. 

Worse: they insist he never had one. It is a story about how completely the self depends upon being recognised by other people. Once the protagonist’s private memory diverges from the social world, he has no stable court of appeal. His face becomes evidence that nobody else will admit exists.

Originally published in French as La Moustache in 1986 and translated by Lanie Goodman, this early Carrère novella already contains many of his lasting preoccupations: identity as an unstable construction, ordinary life opening into terror, and the horrible possibility that certainty may simply be solitude with better posture. Compact, funny in a bleak and increasingly deranged way, and ideal for readers of Kafka, Patricia Highsmith, Roland Topor or Patrick Süskind. 

Vintage Classics paperback, 2024. Light shelf wear and minor corner creasing; clean and sound throughout.