Luigi De Piano May 2020

21st Century American Fiction Université de Neuchâtel

My Year of Rest and Relaxation or the trials and tribulations of contemporary American
Life

“We’re all asleep, brainwashed by a system that

doesn’t give a shit about who we really are1”

“’I ask you to be citizens : Citizens, not spectators

; citizens, not subjects ; responsible citizens
building communities of service and a nation of
character’2”.

The first quote, which is a hypothetical one, and that the narrator of the book assigns to
the artist Ping Xi, is the perfect summary to this novel, as well as to this essay. It contains
everything : the allusion to the sleep of the protagonist, the struggle between society and the
individual, the clash between the self and others, as well as a reflection on identity. The second
one, which is an extract of George W. Bush’s inauguration speech, tells us everything there is
to know about the state of the nation and its lack of social community, right before 9/11. One
could argue that New York City is actually the main character of Ottessa Moshfegh’s novel My
Year of Rest and Relaxation. Because it is its setting, of course, but also because the city
embodies something bigger, something broader. Why not thus read the book as a tale of social
alienation, of the struggle between society and the individual, of the pressure put on the
individual by society and late-capitalism ? No better symbol than New York City for that,
because in such a microcosm where almost every character crumbles under the pressure and
expectation by assuming the most cliché and archetypical roles envisionable, Ottessa Moshfegh
confronts us here to an outsider who’s financial security and physical beauty could have
allowed to take over the most mundane role on the world’s stage, but who elected not to by not
“pretending to have a life3” anymore.
Of course, it is a tale of trauma, and of healing, but in such a fast and furious day and
age, the simple fact of putting one’s life on autopilot or airplane mode, and to consider the
outside world as white noise, acquires an ironic component that requires further investigation.
We will thus see that healing and going against the grain of society’s values go hand in hand,
in order for the protagonist to then reemerge and reappear as a changed entity, able to live a

1
Ottessa Moshfegh, My Year of Rest and Relaxation, London, Vintage, 2019, p.272.
2
Ibid., p.236.
3
Ibid., p.4.

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Luigi De Piano May 2020
21st Century American Fiction Université de Neuchâtel

happy and fulfilling life. It thus becomes a humanistic tale of action and personal responsibility,
which the symbol of the Falling Man or Woman, in the face of adversity, embodies to
perfection.

One of the first things that readers may notice about Ottessa Moshfegh’s novel, is how
fake, superficial and counterfeit the world in which her characters operate really is. Like a
pastiche or parody of itself. Brand names, store names, pill names – at times made up, like
Infermiterol –, names of TV shows, of movies, actors and singers all frantically follow each
other in an epileptic procession of impressive proportions but with no true essential meaning
nor substance beneath the surface. The city of New York itself – or at least the one prior to 9/11
– thus acquires a stucco and cardboard look that seems to have been seen again and again
through pop culture. Like in any Woody Allen movie, everyone has an analyst in town, and
everyone openly quotes him or her on a regular basis ; and like in any episode of Sex and the
City, everything revolves around gossip, vapid and short-term relationships, as well as
meaningless and superficial beauty salon-type talk. New York City truly is the main character
across these different cultural goods, and Moshfegh’s depiction of it is no different. NYC is the
source of every form of alienation the characters seem to live by.
A great example of that can be found in the way the protagonist’s mother talks about
New York City, right before her daughter moves in town for her studies. She says, quite simply
after a terribly painful conversation about her dad’s cancer has just taken place,

“And I hope you’re not packing any shorts. Nobody wears shorts in Manhattan.
And they’ll shoot you in the street if you go around in those disgusting tennis
shoes. You’ll look ridiculous. Your father isn’t paying this much for you to go
look ridiculous in New York City4”.

The contrast between these two conversations is probably what is most surprising about
this passage in the book. Although very different in context, they are very similar in tone,
because the mother possesses this extraordinary capacity to put everything on the same level,
by either downplaying important issues, or by blowing out of proportions what should be trivial
and superficial, like shorts or tennis shoes being a matter of life or death. Not even in the
metropolis yet, and the latter already shines on and irradiates its provincials with codes and

4
Ibid., p.69.

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Luigi De Piano May 2020
21st Century American Fiction Université de Neuchâtel

prohibitions to abide by, in order to “fit in”. New York City thus appears as a living and pulsing
entity imposing its will on people and characters.
Another perfect example of that is the early description of the uptown in which the
protagonist’s apartment is located. Upper East Side New York. East Eighty-fourth Street, where
one can find “a lot of camel-hair coats and black leather briefcases. Burberry scarves and pearl
earrings5”:
“Men took hired cars to work downtown, and women got Botox and boob jobs
and vaginal ‘cinches’ to keep their pussies tight for their husbands and personal
trainers, or so Reva told me6”.

There is an obvious distinction in gender roles made in this passage, as well as an

obvious distinction in activity and status. While men go to work, possibly with their fancy hired
cars and fancy suits, and possibly on Wall Street or in the World Trade Center, stay-at-home
women spend that hard-earned money to take care of their body through exercise and plastic
surgery, and occasionally cheat on their husbands. This appears to be the perfect superficial
couple, where everything seems perfect, indeed, on a superficial and materialistic level, but
where problems are apparent, or at least predictable, precisely because the two individuals are
so archetypical in their conception. It is almost as if visual extravaganza was a replacement for
true depth and character, or at least for self-work and taking action against one’s inner demons.
But more generally speaking, this passage clearly plays on the notion of exuberance,
through accumulation and the use of hyperbatons. The numerous occurrences of “and” are made
to convey that. Women not only get one surgery done ; they get them all done. But the most
surprising occurrence of “and” is the last one, the one who touches upon the sexual partners of
these women. Here again, where one would have expected an alternative “or”, there is no choice
nor selection to be made. Their genitalia is open and available to anyone in an ironic attempt at
altruism that only disguises an expansive and out-of-control sexuality, as well as deviant ethics.
Love might be present, or might have been present once, but is only celebrated through a
crumbling marriage. It is thus basically almost unattached, and definitely infertile and fruitless.
Uptight forty-year-olds of Upper East Side New York are obviously “without children7”, Dr.
Tuttle laughs at the idea that our protagonist could have children8, Trevor never ever once

5
Ibid., p. 27.
6
Ibid., p. 28. We underline.
7
Ibid., p.27
8
Ibid., p.115.

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Luigi De Piano May 2020
21st Century American Fiction Université de Neuchâtel

trusted the birth control pill9, and Reva, in the end, gets her abortion done10. People thus become
free, unattached electrons with no community, sexually loose and unrestricted, in constant
social and economic upward, downward motion. Family is no safe heaven anymore, as the
protagonist could attest herself ; individuals are now just consumers. And of course, Reva’s
shadow is never very far away when it comes to gossip matters. She is the perfect spokeswoman
for this society that has become corrupted in its core. A quick glance at her apartment is enough
to notice that it basically is a 21st century rendition of Ali Baba’s den, but without the true value
of gold and jewels. One could call it a display cabinet that stands for a broader system :

“Her cabinets contained exactly what I’d expected. Herbal laxative teas,
Metamucil, Sweet’N Low, stacks of canned Healthy Choice soups, stacks of
canned tuna. Tostitos. Gold-fish crackers. Reduced fat Skippy. Sugar-free jelly.
Sugar-free Hershey’s Syrup. Rice crackers. Low-fat microwave popcorn. Box
after box of yellow cake mix. When I opened the freezer, smoke billowed out.
The thick frosted inside was crowded with fat-free frozen yogurt. Sugar-free
Popsicles. A cloudy bottle of Belvedere. Déjà vu. Reva’s new favorite cocktail,
she’d told me – had I been on Infermiterol ? – was low-calorie Gatorade and
Vodka11”.

Reva’s character displays it very well : people are now defined by what they buy. They
are consumers above all else. When it comes to her as well, exuberance and number seem to be
a replacement for character, personality and humanity. The duties laid by capitalism upon the
individual are here apparent, both financially and physically. Society wants you to work, to
contribute, to compete with others, in order to then display and parade with shiny goods and
assets that aren’t really yours ; society also wants you to be healthy, to look good, to be a
tantalizing asset yourself, through social status and physical attractiveness. Society thus is an
equalizer that dehumanizes people and turns them into robots.
By adhering to this type of society, to this type of lifestyle, by dwelling in this rotten
apple, the characters themselves quickly acquire a parodic element to them. They are parodies
of themselves, 21st century adaptations of 19th century “types”12, as for Balzac had the proud

9
Ibid., p.175.
10
Ibid., p.258.
11
Ibid., p.249.
12
Ibid., p.146. We borrow the term from the narrator herself. “Peggy was the only friend my mother
had left by the end – a Reva type, for sure”. We underline.
Ibid., p.231 : “Not so much for insomniacs, but for compulsive gamblers and Peeping Toms – adrenaline
junkies, in other words. New York City is full of those types, so I foresee myself getting busier this
year”. We underline.

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Luigi De Piano May 2020
21st Century American Fiction Université de Neuchâtel

upstart, the worked-up artist and the country doctor, Moshfegh definitely builds upon the
clichés of the superficial bimbo, the hotheaded analyst, or even the opportunistic and self-
centered ex-boyfriend.
What is most surprising is how perfect the match was between such a superficial town,
and such a superficial protagonist, who considers herself beautiful, who is surrounded by
constant advertisements and brands, who studied and majored in art history, and who is, at
times, quite an unbearable and too full of herself voice. In her own words, “I was tall and thin
and blond and pretty and young. Even at my worst, I knew I still looked good13”. Here again,
accumulation and exuberance through hyperbatons play an important role. She is not only tall,
but also blond, but also pretty, but also young. She is the whole package, and she knows it. She
is, in a way, quite an archetypical “type” herself, whatever the name we would or could give it.
She is one of them, as self-centered and superficial as the ones she’s criticizing.
This over-simplification of city and characters though serves many purposes. It
obviously embodies and ironically celebrates the shiny and rattling triumph of late-capitalism,
and the concretization of a world and a lifestyle now shaped like a glittery television or Time
Square advertisement. But it also reinforces the strange destiny of the protagonist through
constant contrast. A match made in heaven, which turns out to be, in the end, a match made in
hell.
What went wrong, then ? what is so different about her ? What makes her choose to
retreat rather than parade ? and what makes her choose substance over superficiality ?
The protagonist’s acerbic but lucid point of view is a good reason for it. She is the only
character that has depth, and who is portrayed with contradictory features. Half-outsider, half-
accomplice, she is a “type” herself, but she gets out of it by doing exactly the opposite of what
her best friend Reva – and society through her – could have advised her :

“’I just don’t think it’s really healthy to sleep all day’, she said, popping a few
sticks of gum in her mouth. ‘Maybe all you need is a shoulder to cry on. You’d
be surprised how much better you’ll feel after a good cry. Better than any pill
can make you feel’. When Reva gave advice, it sounded as though she were
reading a bad made-for-TV movie script. ‘A walk around the block could do
wonders for your mood’, she said. ‘Aren’t you hungry ?’14”.

13
Ibid., p.27.
14
Ibid., p.56-57.

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Luigi De Piano May 2020
21st Century American Fiction Université de Neuchâtel

What is so powerful about this quote, is that readers will probably agree with Reva15,
because in such a day and age, where productivity and appearance are everything, who in their
right mind would come to such an absurd conclusion on how to lead a healthy and fulfilling life
? But this just goes to show how deeply ingrained in our psyche that ideology really is. But in
the protagonist’s as well, because her subconscious is clearly trying to fight back during her
blackouts, by keeping her a customer of luxury brands, by keeping her sexually “active”
through sex chats with strangers, by keeping her socially active through nightclubs, and by
making her go to Reva’s mother’s funeral :

“This was when my online purchasing of lingerie and designer jeans began in
earnest. It seemed that while I was sleeping, some superficial part of me was
taking aim at a life of beauty and sex appeal. I made appointments to get waxed.
I booked time at a spa that offered infrared treatments and colonics and facials.
One day, I cancelled my credit card in the hope that doing so might deter me
from filling my nonexistent datebook with the frills of someone I used to think I
was supposed to be. A week later, a new credit card showed up in the mail. I cut
it in half16”.

The only solution for her is thus to shut down completely. And the artist Ping Xi is,
fittingly so, the only person that will allow her to approach life as a “blank canvas17” again.
While everybody around her seems to take care of their appearance above all else, the
protagonist operates a shift by tackling down her own inner issues. Appearance thus doesn’t
matter anymore, and despite being attractive, she goes from initial cockiness to almost hating
her body, or at least discarding it completely in its potential value. That is how one can interpret
the very crude passages that are devoted to bodily functions. The protagonist has changed
paradigm completely.

Funnily and paradoxically enough for someone who decides to sleep for a whole year,
our protagonist values action. Sleeping is precisely her way of taking action. That is precisely
what distinguishes her from others, who simply care of fitting in their respective molds, and of
taking part in this fierce and blinding rat race that is imposed on them. Their inaction, their way
of going through life like zombies is what she is really rebelling against. At the heart of the

15
John Harrison calls the protagonist’s retreat an “expression of privilege”. “My Year of Rest and
Relaxation by Ottessa Moshfegh review – an experiment in oblivion”, The Guardian, Wed 11 Jul 2018.
16
Ottessa Moshfegh, My Year of Rest and Relaxation, op. cit., p.86.
17
Ibid., p.258.

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Luigi De Piano May 2020
21st Century American Fiction Université de Neuchâtel

novel thus lies a deep metaphysical meditation. Death is everywhere : from the first to the last
page, but the protagonist’s relationship towards it drastically changes throughout the book.
While it might have been seen as appealing and enticing at the beginning of the novel, death
through suicide becomes unthinkable at the end of it. People die, relationships come to an end,
even parts of the self die in order to be reborn into something different, but the truth of life, in
order to live a fulfilling life, we learn as readers, has to be constant mutation and change18,
which the novel’s plot embodies very well. Then the tragic epilogue of life is the same for
everyone, but one can at least be a Falling Man or Woman, rather than a follower.
In that regard, the legacy left behind by her parents is key. Neither like her father, who
died passively and as a witness of his own death by cancer, nor like her mother, who committed
suicide by mixing up sedatives with alcohol, the protagonist goes for the middle-road, the
moderate approach. Not killing herself, but getting close to it metaphorically through sleep –
death’s cousin – and pills. That is how one can explain the fascination for death that particularly
sets in in the last chapters of the novel. The feeling of numbness found in sleep, is compared to
the one that comes from dying of hypothermia. But as our protagonist drifts and drifts away
even more from life, she still expresses the will to “emerge from it renewed19”, to “reappear in
some new form20”. She thus gets closer and closer to her mother’s path of life, particularly by
approaching death in a dangerously close fashion, but is able to withdraw at what seems to be
the very last second.

“Someone once said that when you die of hypothermia, you get cold and sleepy,
things slow down, and then you just drift away. You don’t feel a thing. That
sounded nice. That was the best way to die – awake and dreaming, feeling
nothing. I could take the train to Coney Island, I thought, walk along the beach
in the freezing wind, and swim out into the ocean. Then I’d just float on my back
looking up at the stars, go numb, get sleepy, drift, drift. Isn’t it only fair that I
should get to choose how I’ll die ? I wouldn’t die like my father did, passive and
quiet while cancer ate him alive. At least my mother did things her own way. I’d
never thought to admire her before for that. At least she had guts. At least she
took matters into her own hands21”.

18
Ibid., p.268 : “The stupidity of wanting something ‘forever’”.
19
Ibid., p.258.
20
Ibid., p.84.
21
Ibid., p.204-205. We underline.

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Luigi De Piano May 2020
21st Century American Fiction Université de Neuchâtel

In a way, she is taking matters into her own hands, or at least approaching that stage,
just like her mother did before her. Even better, she’s able to apply that strength to life, not to
death. Why not then read this book as an account on action, as a wake-up call to people,
intimating them to take their lives back, to take matters into their own hands ? It is precisely to
show that life is precious, that our protagonist decides to dive head-first into sleep for a whole
year. Death was never the goal, “self-preservation22” was, dealing and getting over her traumas
was. After having “wasted” that year of her life, she will be able to enjoy every single moment
of what is left of her now new existence. After having stewed in her chrysalid for a whole year,
she is now a full-blown butterfly that experiences life and the world for what seems to be the
very first time.
The process thus logically starts with baby steps. Getting rid of almost all of her
furniture, donating all of her designer clothes to Reva, in a sentence, by letting go of things of
the past, and by starting to happily reconnect with the simple things in life. The senses are here
primordial, because they seem to be awake for the first time in the novel. Sight is put to good
use while all the colors of the rainbow are taking over such a dim, bland and mineral novel :

“Things were alive. Life buzzed between each shade of green, from dark pines
and supple ferns to lime green moss growing on a huge, dry gray rock. Honey
locusts and ginkgos aflare in yellows. What was cowardly about the color yellow
? Nothing.
‘What kind of bird is that ?’ I heard a child ask his young mother, pointing
to a bird that looked like a psychedelic crow. Its feathers were iridescent black,
a rainbow reflected in the gleaming darkness, eyes bright white and alive,
vigilant23”.

This passage opens up and closes with an important word, the word alive. Alive are the
green shades of the greenery ; alive are the flamboyant colors of insects and birds. Life, in its
most extravagant forms, is blooming everywhere. Even our first confrontation to an actual
child, among the novel, comforts us in our view. Life is taking over.
Also through sounds, and through earing. Alliterations can be found in almost every
line, ingraining many touches of life in them through logical and methodical touches of melodic
notes. Things are complete. The world is a coherent whole that now makes sense. And New
York City seems a pastoral Eden. By mystically changing what’s inside her, the protagonist

22
Ibid., p.7.
23
Ibid., p.287. We underline.

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Luigi De Piano May 2020
21st Century American Fiction Université de Neuchâtel

also now discovers the city with brand new eyes. After betting on life, the protagonist then goes
through a change of paradigm. Things slow down, materialistic elements start to disappear, and
the self, along with all of its demons, starts to take over. From here on out, commodities,
manufactured goods, are replaced by simple, organic things that people don’t seem to even
notice.
We thus find a growing wish for simple sensory well-being near the end of the novel.
The protagonist’s soul, after having been cleansed one tear at a time24, is now ready to live
again :
“I wrote Post-it notes requesting fresh fruits, mineral water, grilled salmon from
‘a good Japanese restaurant.’ I asked for a candle to burn while I bathed. During
this period, my waking hours were spent gently, lovingly, growing reaccustomed
to a feeling of cozy extravagance. I put on a little weight, and so when I lay down
on the living room floor, my bones didn’t hurt. My face lost its mean edge. I
asked for flowers. ‘Lilies.’ ‘Birds of paradise.’ ‘Daisies.’ ‘A branch of catkins.’
I jogged in place, did leg lifts, push-ups. It was easier and easier to pass the time
between getting up and going down25”.

For the first time in a while, she goes for fresh and tasty food, as well as for love, comfort
and inner peace. Mission accomplished.

“There she is, a human being, diving into

the unknown, and she is wide awake26”

Due to the thematic of the novel, one of the most used verbs in the narration is to fall
asleep, which is pretty obvious. But interestingly, its linguistic composition already gives out a
kind of mystical meaning or process that lies behind it. – As if the ground was vanishing and
letting the recipient of sleep go through a new state of being that could only be reached by an
uncontrolled fall through substance. Pages 274 to 276 actually describe that process admirably.
But as one person falls asleep, another one falls from the 78th floor of the North Tower. She not
only falls, she dives. The gestures are almost the same, only the intensities differ. But as the
first one did it through sleep and with her eyes closed, the latter challenges death frontally and

24
Ibid., p.275.
25
Ibid., p.273.
26
Ibid., p.289.

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21st Century American Fiction Université de Neuchâtel

with no hope of escaping the confrontation. She decides for herself, which earns her the respect
of the narrator. Defying life and death until the very end ; finding life in death as well.

“I was like a newborn animal…My sleep

had worked…I could move on27”

We’ve seen the importance that the symbol of the city of New York possesses, at least
in the first half of the novel. It is what dictates the rules, and what defines people’s actions. The
novel thus acquires a sociological quality that is expected but worthwhile.
But its most interesting aspect lies in the introspective gesture of its protagonist. It is
what gives it a metaphysical, as well as humanistic quality. It brings us back to earth by
displaying the inner demons of a common mortal. Her doubts, her fears, her insecurities, her
healing, and in the end, the cracks in the whole system. From the dehumanizing machine, to the
humans that lie beneath it. By shifting the attention from the city to the protagonist through the
narrative of sleep, the author confronts us to a tale of action and personal responsibility that
could metaphorically be the reader’s at any point in his life, but probably in less exuberant
terms. Head-first into the unknown as the only way.

27
Ibid., p.278 and p.288.

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