Robert Pinget's Mahu or The Material tells the story of Mahu, who, unlike his ambitious, successful brothers, is a lazy man who approaches the world around him with a defiant spirit and a witty outlook on life. Part of the reason for Mahu's laziness is that he may be nothing more than a character in a failing novel by his friend Latirail, a novel that is being overrun by characters invented by yet a different author<BR>The second half of this book consists of Mahu's strange and hilarious musings on everything from belly dancers to how he catches ideas from other people in the same way he catches germs.