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I've been reading a lot lately. Seems I can hardly write enough about the books I've been reading and every other entry starts, I just finished reading... Oh well, I really like books!
But L'assommoir was very good. I did read it in translation and am glad I did as it was full of slang. A story of a French working class family falling into drink and degradation. A dark spiral that has no hope. Well there's a few pages of not so dark in the beginning, and some scenes that were actually quite funny. The main character ends up marrying and has a successful business for awhile. The wedding scene was particularly interesting to me, as they spent the afternoon of their wedding in the Louvre. It was really fun to see what the Louvre was like at the time, and what people thought of it.
I felt that the accident that forced her husband to become the bad drunkard was a bit forced. I also didn't quiet understand why she wouldn't let him go to the hospital, it seemed to me reading it that when he broke his legs that would be the best place to recover and that she was being selfish or odd wanting him to live at home, particularly when other characters thought it was odd that she wanted to nurse him. But later they explained how awful the hospitals were, and that care was better in the home with a doctor visiting, and that it was considered unselfish to nurse someone yourself. So that was another interesting cultural insight. But the husband's decent into alcoholism reminded me a lot of what people write about people becoming drug addicts these days. The fall reminded me of Chiristiane F. a little. How his wife could justify it to start with, it's only wine, it puts him in a good mood. And then later became horrified when he started drinking spirits, but gradually came to accept that too, and eventually when it became clear that he would never stop she found herself joining him as there were no other choices left to her.
A hundred pages from the end, I found myself wondering how on earth things could get worse for the next hundred pages as they'd already seemed to hit bottom. But they did. I felt quiet sad for the main character, she seemed like a good woman who'd just been down trodden to the point where she just couldn't bring herself to care anymore, at least about herself. The descriptions of the little girl who lived beside them and whose mother was beaten to death as she later was were almost too horrifying to be able to read. I felt really quite depressed by the end of the book. It got to me. But with that said, I'd definitely recommend it, and glad that sphinxi suggested it to me.
I'm also reading Nana by him at the moment, but have started reading it in french so that's going to take a lot longer. I'm really liking it though. It's hard not to give in to the temptation just to read it in English but I know my French will not get better that way.
But L'assommoir was very good. I did read it in translation and am glad I did as it was full of slang. A story of a French working class family falling into drink and degradation. A dark spiral that has no hope. Well there's a few pages of not so dark in the beginning, and some scenes that were actually quite funny. The main character ends up marrying and has a successful business for awhile. The wedding scene was particularly interesting to me, as they spent the afternoon of their wedding in the Louvre. It was really fun to see what the Louvre was like at the time, and what people thought of it.
I felt that the accident that forced her husband to become the bad drunkard was a bit forced. I also didn't quiet understand why she wouldn't let him go to the hospital, it seemed to me reading it that when he broke his legs that would be the best place to recover and that she was being selfish or odd wanting him to live at home, particularly when other characters thought it was odd that she wanted to nurse him. But later they explained how awful the hospitals were, and that care was better in the home with a doctor visiting, and that it was considered unselfish to nurse someone yourself. So that was another interesting cultural insight. But the husband's decent into alcoholism reminded me a lot of what people write about people becoming drug addicts these days. The fall reminded me of Chiristiane F. a little. How his wife could justify it to start with, it's only wine, it puts him in a good mood. And then later became horrified when he started drinking spirits, but gradually came to accept that too, and eventually when it became clear that he would never stop she found herself joining him as there were no other choices left to her.
A hundred pages from the end, I found myself wondering how on earth things could get worse for the next hundred pages as they'd already seemed to hit bottom. But they did. I felt quiet sad for the main character, she seemed like a good woman who'd just been down trodden to the point where she just couldn't bring herself to care anymore, at least about herself. The descriptions of the little girl who lived beside them and whose mother was beaten to death as she later was were almost too horrifying to be able to read. I felt really quite depressed by the end of the book. It got to me. But with that said, I'd definitely recommend it, and glad that sphinxi suggested it to me.
I'm also reading Nana by him at the moment, but have started reading it in french so that's going to take a lot longer. I'm really liking it though. It's hard not to give in to the temptation just to read it in English but I know my French will not get better that way.