French literature recommendations

[WICKES]

Can anyone recommend some French writers? One of my all-time favourite writers is Hermann Hesse, so if anyone can recommend a French equivalent I'd be eternally grateful. I also love PG Wodehouse, Aldous Huxley, Robert Graves and Kurt Vonnegut so, again, any recommendations for French equivalents would be much appreciated (please...no Camus or Sartre!!). Thanks:smile5:

[hawthorns]

I'd highly recommend these:

Baudelaire
Proust
Maupassant
Rimbaud

[ennison]

Tournier
Littell
And the Irish Frenchman - you know who

[stlukesguild]

I'll second Hawthorns' recommendations:

Baudelaire
Proust
Maupassant
Rimbaud

... and add a few obvious names:

Montaigne
Rabelais
Rousseau
Hugo
Balzac
Zola
Flaubert
Gautier
Verlaine
Genet

[Emil Miller]

Can anyone recommend some French writers? One of my all-time favourite writers is Hermann Hesse, so if anyone can recommend a French equivalent I'd be eternally grateful. I also love PG Wodehouse, Aldous Huxley, Robert Graves and Kurt Vonnegut so, again, any recommendations for French equivalents would be much appreciated (please...no Camus or Sartre!!). Thanks:smile5:

It's difficult to match the authors you have named with French equivalents but, setting aside the matchless P.G.Wodehouse, you might try:

Le Grand Meaulnes by Alain Forrestier

La Symphonie Pastoral by André Gide

Thérèse Desqueyroux by François Mauriac

La Condition Humaine by André Malraux

If you want them in translation, I'm pretty sure they have all been translated into English .

[Helga]

I took a course in French literature and what stood out in my opinion was Perec, I have only read two books by him but I would recommend both, 'W' is very very good. I know Camus isn't exactly French but he wrote in french and his books are great!

I never know where to place Milan Kundera, he is French now even though he wasn't born in France. I like his books a lot.

[Bibliophile79]

Got to add Dumas to that list

[chrisvia]

For a contemporary French writer somewhat in the collective vein of those you've listed, you could try Michel Houellebecq. I, myself, prefer the classics, from Moliere and Racine to Rimbaud and the symbolists to Falubert and Zola and Gide and Sand!

[hawthorns]

I took a course in French literature and what stood out in my opinion was Perec, I have only read two books by him but I would recommend both, 'W' is very very good. I know Camus isn't exactly French but he wrote in french and his books are great!

I never know where to place Milan Kundera, he is French now even though he wasn't born in France. I like his books a lot.

Have you read Life, A User's Manual? Rave reviews, but I think I was put off by the consistent criticism that the payoff wasn't worth the excruciating detail. What was his best work?

[stlukesguild]

Milan Kundera is about as much a French writer as Picasso was a French painter. Kundera is the Czech Republic's most recognized living writer. He was deeply involved in Czech politics. Following the brutal Soviet invasion and crackdown in response to the Czech reform of the so-called Prague Spring, Kundera remained passionately involved in the attempt to reform Czech communism. He argued vehemently in print with fellow Czech writer Václav Havel, acting as something of an apologist for the Communist regime. He left Czechoslovakia in 1975 and was stripped of his citizenship in 1979.

In spite of this, Kundera's best or best known works were written in Czechoslovakia and/or in Czech. To call him a French writer makes about as much sense as to call Picasso or Chagall French painters.

[Jassy Melson]

I suggest Stendhal's The Red and the Black. Followed by any of Balzac's work, Hugo, Flaubert.

[ladderandbucket]

Antoine de Saint-Exupéry's autobiographical novels.

[mal4mac]

I'll second Hawthorns' recommendations:

Baudelaire
Proust
Maupassant
Rimbaud




In what way are Baudelaire, Rimbaud and Proust similar to Hesse, beyond being "deep"? Maupassant is closer... deep *and* writes clever stories that are easy to read.



Montaigne
Rabelais
Rousseau


Again... how are these writers like Hesse? Did any of them actually write novels?



Hugo
Balzac
Zola
Flaubert


I agree with these recommendations!

[hawthorns]

In what way are Baudelaire, Rimbaud and Proust similar to Hesse, beyond being "deep"? Maupassant is closer... deep *and* writes clever stories that are easy to read.



Again... how are these writers like Hesse? Did any of them actually write novels?



I agree with these recommendations!



You're right--I have no idea because I've never read Hesse. Should have noted that. The best I could do was recommend my favorite French authors. But honestly, is there such thing as an "equivalent?" Every one has a style all their own.

[OrphanPip]

These are difficult writers to match with French equivalents. I'd second Gide and Genet probably. If you want to include French Canadian literature, Hubert Aquin's Next Episode has a Vonnegut feel to it.

[tscherff]

try sartre

[chrisvia]

Trying to find an intersection of the proposed writers (Graves, Hesse, Vonnegut, et al.) is a difficult problem.

I propose giving Michel Houellebecq a shot.