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Dan Yack #2
Le Plan de l'aiguille
Passant en revue les utopies et les faillites d'un siècle bouleversé par la Grande Guerre, ce roman autobiographique se présente comme une passion de l'homme moderne.
204 pages, Paperback
Published September 13, 1983
74 people want to read
About the author
Blaise Cendrars
275 books278 followersFrédéric Louis Sauser, better known as Blaise Cendrars, was a Swiss novelist and poet naturalized French in 1916. He was a writer of considerable influence in the modernist movement.
His father, an inventor-businessman, was Swiss, his mother Scottish. He spent his childhood in Alexandria, Naples, Brindisi, Neuchâtel, and numerous other places, while accompanying his father, who endlessly pursued business schemes, none successfully.
At the age of fifteen, Cendrars left home to travel in Russia, Persia, China while working as a jewel merchant; several years later, he wrote about this in his poem, Transiberien. He was in Paris before 1910, where he got in touch with several names of Paris' bélle époque: Guillaume Apollinaire, Modigliani, Marc Chagall and many more. Cendrars then traveled to America, where he wrote his first long poem Pâques à New-York. The next year appeared The Transsibérien.
When he came back to France, I World War was started and he joined the French Foreign Legion. He was sent to the front line in the Somme where from mid-December 1914 until February 1915. During the attacks in Champagne in September 1915 that Cendrars lost his right arm. He described this war experience in the books La Main coupée.
After the war he returned to Paris, becaming an important part of the artistic community in Montparnasse. There, among others, used to meet with other writers such as Henry Miller, John Dos Passos and Ernest Hemingway.
During the 1920's he published two long novels, Moravagine and Les Confessions de Dan Yack. Into the 1930’s published a number of “novelized” biographies or volumes of extravagant reporting, such as L’Or, based on the life of John August Sutter, and Rhum, “reportage romance” dealing with the life and trials of Jean Galmont, a misfired Cecil Rhodes of Guiana.
La Belle Epoque was the great age of discovery in arts and letters. Cendrars, very much of the epoch, was sketched by Caruso, painted by Léon Bakst, by Léger, by Modigliani, by Chagall; and in his turn helped discover Negro art, jazz, and the modern music of Les Six. His home base was always Paris, for several years in the Rue de Savoie, later, for many years, in the Avenue Montaigne, and in the country, his little house at Tremblay-sur Mauldre (Seine-et-Oise), though he continued to travel extensively. He worked for a short while in Hollywood in 1936, at the time of the filming of Sutter’s Gold. From 1924 to 1936, went so constantly to South America. This life globertrottering life was pictured in his book Bourlinguer, published in 1948.
Another remarkable works apparead in the 40s were L’Homme Foudroyé (1945), La Main Coupée (1946), Le Lotissement du Ciel (1949), that constitute his best and most important work. His last major work was published in 1957, entitled Trop, C’est Trop.
==========
Sources:
- http://www.theparisreview.org/intervi...
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blaise_...
His father, an inventor-businessman, was Swiss, his mother Scottish. He spent his childhood in Alexandria, Naples, Brindisi, Neuchâtel, and numerous other places, while accompanying his father, who endlessly pursued business schemes, none successfully.
At the age of fifteen, Cendrars left home to travel in Russia, Persia, China while working as a jewel merchant; several years later, he wrote about this in his poem, Transiberien. He was in Paris before 1910, where he got in touch with several names of Paris' bélle époque: Guillaume Apollinaire, Modigliani, Marc Chagall and many more. Cendrars then traveled to America, where he wrote his first long poem Pâques à New-York. The next year appeared The Transsibérien.
When he came back to France, I World War was started and he joined the French Foreign Legion. He was sent to the front line in the Somme where from mid-December 1914 until February 1915. During the attacks in Champagne in September 1915 that Cendrars lost his right arm. He described this war experience in the books La Main coupée.
After the war he returned to Paris, becaming an important part of the artistic community in Montparnasse. There, among others, used to meet with other writers such as Henry Miller, John Dos Passos and Ernest Hemingway.
During the 1920's he published two long novels, Moravagine and Les Confessions de Dan Yack. Into the 1930’s published a number of “novelized” biographies or volumes of extravagant reporting, such as L’Or, based on the life of John August Sutter, and Rhum, “reportage romance” dealing with the life and trials of Jean Galmont, a misfired Cecil Rhodes of Guiana.
La Belle Epoque was the great age of discovery in arts and letters. Cendrars, very much of the epoch, was sketched by Caruso, painted by Léon Bakst, by Léger, by Modigliani, by Chagall; and in his turn helped discover Negro art, jazz, and the modern music of Les Six. His home base was always Paris, for several years in the Rue de Savoie, later, for many years, in the Avenue Montaigne, and in the country, his little house at Tremblay-sur Mauldre (Seine-et-Oise), though he continued to travel extensively. He worked for a short while in Hollywood in 1936, at the time of the filming of Sutter’s Gold. From 1924 to 1936, went so constantly to South America. This life globertrottering life was pictured in his book Bourlinguer, published in 1948.
Another remarkable works apparead in the 40s were L’Homme Foudroyé (1945), La Main Coupée (1946), Le Lotissement du Ciel (1949), that constitute his best and most important work. His last major work was published in 1957, entitled Trop, C’est Trop.
==========
Sources:
- http://www.theparisreview.org/intervi...
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blaise_...
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Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews
September 6, 2013
For a joint review of Gold, Dan Yack and Confessions of Dan Yack, go here:
http://www.jeffbursey.com/downloads/B...
http://www.jeffbursey.com/downloads/B...
March 4, 2025
The fun of elementary physics.
Part II of Cendrars’ Dan Yack story, a thinly-veiled autobiography as always, should be seen in relation to Part I as:
→FAB=−→FBA
I know. And it hurts like hell coming down to Earth, yes. Cendrars breaks hearts here. But the above Newtonian expression impugns my need to explicate further; it really says it all. Anything more is just vainglorious public masturbation; blithely couched referentialism of hopelessly coded, subjective symbols of ‘cool.’
Meh, fuck that noise, guys. I’m better than that. WE are better than that. I’m just going to go listen to Känguru by Guru Guru (Brain Records/brain-1007 LP; 1972, Germany), follow that up with some ファーラウト (that corny old chestnut!), and bliss-out into a nap with my new Saint Etienne boxset instead. Peace be with you.
Part II of Cendrars’ Dan Yack story, a thinly-veiled autobiography as always, should be seen in relation to Part I as:
→FAB=−→FBA
I know. And it hurts like hell coming down to Earth, yes. Cendrars breaks hearts here. But the above Newtonian expression impugns my need to explicate further; it really says it all. Anything more is just vainglorious public masturbation; blithely couched referentialism of hopelessly coded, subjective symbols of ‘cool.’
Meh, fuck that noise, guys. I’m better than that. WE are better than that. I’m just going to go listen to Känguru by Guru Guru (Brain Records/brain-1007 LP; 1972, Germany), follow that up with some ファーラウト (that corny old chestnut!), and bliss-out into a nap with my new Saint Etienne boxset instead. Peace be with you.
December 13, 2012
First published in 1929, this is a ‘sequel’ to Cendrars’ earlier delirious masterpiece, *Dan Yack*, which recounted the bizarre adventures of an eccentric millionaire and the three bohemians he takes with him on an overwintering expedition to a remote island off the coast of Antarctica. The *Confessions* is looser in structure and wider ranging in subject matter. It can, in fact, be read without any knowledge of the prior volume. It consists of nine ‘cylinders’ (Cendrars recited the book into a dictaphone rather than writing it out by hand) that detail various periods in Dan Yack’s extraordinary life, generally with a focus on or around Mireille, the love of his life, a young girl he rescued from a convent and launches as an actress in films based on the stories of Poe and Hoffmann. But Mireille turns out to be a disturbed soul and these roles propel her on a slide downwards into madness and death. There are dark currents flowing through all of Cendrars’ work, but they are never gloomy or claustrophobic, partly because the author himself had such a thoroughly life-affirming personality. Dan Yack is an astounding character and it’s a shame that Cendrars never resurrected him for yet more adventures.
March 1, 2013
Not a five because it does not have the impact, expanse or feral will of Dan Yack - but it is a delightful little read packed with verbal picnics and seedy wisdom. Cendrars never seemed to care about who he might have offended and I respect that. If you are offended by whaling, whoring and boozing - best to seek your pleasure elsewhere - but if you can enjoy great writing regardless of great morality - you will find something to appreciate here. Flowing with vitality - Cendrars should be more widely read - his prose is dense but flows well and is never selfish. I lack the time to write a more detailed review but if you're familiar with Cendrars - you'll like this. Better than Moravagine, not as essential as Dan Yack - this is Cendrars writing about love, blood, sperm, cars, technology and money all with a most casual coolness that I find infectious. I don't whale or go whoring - but I vicariously enjoy such actions through the vibrant writing of Cendrars. Modigliani painted his portrait - but it's Soutine that echos his palette most accurately.
April 1, 2017
A blazing little fireball of a novel. Set in Paris on Armistice night 1918, a man falls in love with a young girl and they both go sort of mad. An incandescent roman candle of a book. I found out about Cendrars reading Henry Miller's "The Books in My Life" and it's no wonder - you can clearly see the influence Cendrars had on him.
December 14, 2007
I didn't think I'd end up dropping this book onto the ignominious shelf; but I can't bring myself to pick it up again. More than anything, I object to the stupid, badly written female character who reads like a doe-eyed, imbecile impossibility.
Even against the backdrop of heady, post-war brothel-bestrewn Paris, Cendrars does not entice. There is some weird, acquisitive, distant and uncomprehending lolita thing going on in this book; but without any psychological depth.
"What glorious days, so hot, so long! When Mamma comes to see me, they stuff me with chocolates so that I won't cry. I forget so much, so many things. I remember that Papa loved to have me with him. Always. As often as possible. And I too loved going out with him."
Barf.
I don't care what happens and I only have forty pages left.
Even against the backdrop of heady, post-war brothel-bestrewn Paris, Cendrars does not entice. There is some weird, acquisitive, distant and uncomprehending lolita thing going on in this book; but without any psychological depth.
"What glorious days, so hot, so long! When Mamma comes to see me, they stuff me with chocolates so that I won't cry. I forget so much, so many things. I remember that Papa loved to have me with him. Always. As often as possible. And I too loved going out with him."
Barf.
I don't care what happens and I only have forty pages left.
November 18, 2008
There is so much jammed into this little 120 page book. Layered and ambiguous and carved in an unforgettable voice, even in translation, though Cendrars would be incredible in French:
"The crater-riddled field started to whirl round madly and it seemed to me that a flashing sword, flinging off roaring sparks, fell from the heavens to smite and massacre everything on the surface of the earth, like a gramophone needle scratching, scoring, digging furrows in an old, already worn record, on a fully-wound gramophone, whose human voices are finally and irrevocably doomed." I thought that was a particularly striking passage; but then again, it was about six am when I read that sentence, and I had been up all night reading that book, so perhaps it was the environment, or some establishment between Cendrars and myself, earned over the course of the night--a sort of intimacy, perhaps.
"The crater-riddled field started to whirl round madly and it seemed to me that a flashing sword, flinging off roaring sparks, fell from the heavens to smite and massacre everything on the surface of the earth, like a gramophone needle scratching, scoring, digging furrows in an old, already worn record, on a fully-wound gramophone, whose human voices are finally and irrevocably doomed." I thought that was a particularly striking passage; but then again, it was about six am when I read that sentence, and I had been up all night reading that book, so perhaps it was the environment, or some establishment between Cendrars and myself, earned over the course of the night--a sort of intimacy, perhaps.
April 29, 2021
Reminds me of Moorcocks Byzantium endures series - the same stylistic flourishes
There is warmth here. Humanity. A real contrast to for example Celine.
“If I am to be killed, so be it, but I want to live”
Mireille declaration of love is exquisite, heart wrenching
Her insight into acting - the detail and evocation - just like Byzantium endures
Then her desire to be a boy, to play a boy
Her sadness...
I love his repeated phrases; “the blue evening” “night. Outside, it’s raining...Outside, it’s raining ...It’s raining...It’s always raining”
His memories of the front. His memories and how he weaves them is affecting
His memories and recollections remind me of Beckett
Sadness on every page
Mireille dies... wills herself to death?
He adopts a child, retires to a simple life working in a florist in Paris
There is warmth here. Humanity. A real contrast to for example Celine.
“If I am to be killed, so be it, but I want to live”
Mireille declaration of love is exquisite, heart wrenching
Her insight into acting - the detail and evocation - just like Byzantium endures
Then her desire to be a boy, to play a boy
Her sadness...
I love his repeated phrases; “the blue evening” “night. Outside, it’s raining...Outside, it’s raining ...It’s raining...It’s always raining”
His memories of the front. His memories and how he weaves them is affecting
His memories and recollections remind me of Beckett
Sadness on every page
Mireille dies... wills herself to death?
He adopts a child, retires to a simple life working in a florist in Paris
June 25, 2014
Cendrars has the ability to be intimate and moving in 120 pages to the extent that it kinda shames most writers that try to build that kind of spirit of life and loss up in much longer and tedious novels. This ones a gem.
July 25, 2011
I picked this up for about 50p in a bargain bin and I'm so glad I did! It's a brilliant modernist novel, clever and sad and entertaining in equal measure.
January 4, 2017
Swiss guy writes book about English bloke in French read in English - some lovely poetic pokes in dis one - ya typical early modern European stuff - if ya inta that stuff you'll rate it I reckon
December 29, 2025
This is a good book. It's full of bon vivant et aventure - an insulating literary snack; what great books are all about.
Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews