Louis Ferdinand Celine

[E.A Rumfield]

Journey to the End of the Night was one of the best novels I've ever read. Celine is like a rabid dog attacking everything. Is anyone around here familiar with his work? What else would you suggest reading?

[stlukesguild]

I'm not a big Celine fan... but if you like that sort of stuff check into Jean Genet... perhaps start with Our Lady of the Flowers.

[Lykren]

Have you read Henry Miller? You would like Tropic of Cancer, I think.

[crusoe]

His "Journey to the End of the Night" says it all. It's the quintessential Celine-Book.
I read a few others (in german) like "Castle to Castle" and "Death on Credit", but that
was a long time ago and I only remember (in blurred pictures) his "Journey...
Crazy that you mention him. I just bought that Book again from a used book dealer for
a fiver...waiting to be read again.

[Des Essientes]

Read "Death on the Installment" plan next. It is Celine's prequel to the story told in "Journey to the End of the Night" and it is easily as good a novel as Journey. I actually enjoyed it even more than "Journey to the End of the Night". Celine also has a novel written later called "London Bridge" which fills in Ferdinand's story between Death and Journey and it too is great. It tells a tale of French pimp and prostitutes living in London during WW1 and it has some really fascinating characters. Celine's final trilogy of novels, "Castle to Castle", "North", and "Fairytale for Another Time", is also very interesting, although his attempt to justify his collaboration with the Nazis in them may be off-putting to some readers, the events and the settings they depict will draw you in if you read them. Celine's description of the portraits of the Hohenzollerns in one of the castles is hilarious. So too is his cat Bebert's setting off alarms and getting German soldiers shot. I'd also like to recommend a slim volume by Celine called "Conversations with Professor Y". It is an absolutely hilarious send-up of his critics.

[Desolation]

Celine was a great formative influence on me...Journey is certainly his best, and he never quite managed to live up to it in my opinion. Bukowski said it best, "he wrote two great books and then went insane."

Death on the Installment Plan, his second novel, is really good. I've heard that Guignol's Band is also very good in the original French, but the only available English translation is awful. The World War II trilogy, Castle to Castle, North, and Rigadoon are often praised, but I found them pretty alienating.

Other books you might like:
Tropic of Cancer by Henry Miller
Nausea by Jean-Paul Sartre
The Thief's Journal by Jean Genet
Molloy by Samuel Beckett

[E.A Rumfield]

Yea I read Journey about a year ago. Bukowski mentioned Journey as one of the best novels. The next day I went to the library and somehow it was there. I couldn't put it down. You know everything is going to go wrong and you're waiting for it to fall apart and while you're waiting he's reminding you, it's all going to ****.

I might read Henry Miller next because someone else mentioned that to me. I ordered Spider House by Paul Bowles. Has anyone read Bowles?

[crusoe]

I might read Henry Miller next because someone else mentioned that to me. I ordered Spider House by Paul Bowles. Has anyone read Bowles?

Maybe you'd like "The Air-Conditioned Nightmare" by Miller.

[Kyriakos]

Sole translation of journey to the end of the night available here is one which i heavily dislike, so i could not read it.