DRIFTING: A vau-l'eau

by Joris-Karl Huysmans, Brendan King (Translator)

The misfortunes of Jean Folantin, a downtrodden clerk working for the Ministry of the Interior in Paris, form the subject of J.-K. Huysmans’ blackly comic novella, Drifting (À vau-l’eau). At first glance, Folantin’s problems seem to be a world away from those of Jean Floressas des Esseintes, the aristocratic anti-hero of Huysmans’ Decadent classic Against Nature, written just two years later in 1884. But the two men share more than just a first name: like des Esseintes, Folantin is in the throes of an existential crisis: alienated from a Paris undergoing rapid modernisation, the pace of social change leaves him feeling out of place, impotent, a small cog in an impersonal commercial world. Through the distorting lens of Huysmans’ dark sense of humour, the dyspeptic Folantin is transformed into a modern-day Ulysses, and his tortuous quest through the streets of Haussmann’s Paris to find a capable housekeeper and a decent meal reaches its conclusion in one of the most daring anti-climaxes – literally speaking – in the whole of nineteenth century fiction.

This new translation by Brendan King includes, for the first time in English, a contemporary profile of Huysmans’ life and work in which the author plays both interviewer and interviewee, and which was published pseudonymously for the journal, Les Hommes d’aujourd’hui (Men of Today) in 1885.

“[The] Iliad of indigestion.” James Huneker, Unicorns

Genres: Fiction, French Literature, France, Literature, Classics, 19th Century, Novels

102 pages, Kindle Edition

First published January 1, 1882

About the author

Charles Marie Georges Huysmans was a French novelist who published his works as Joris-Karl Huysmans. AKA: J.-K. Huysmans.

He is most famous for the novel À rebours (Against Nature). His style is remarkable for its idiosyncratic use of the French language, wide-ranging vocabulary, wealth of detailed and sensuous description, and biting, satirical wit.

The novels are also noteworthy for their encyclopedic documentation, ranging from the catalogue of decadent Latin authors in À rebours to the discussion of the symbiology of Christian architecture in La cathédrale. Huysmans' work expresses a disgust with modern life and a deep pessimism, which led the author first to the philosophy of Arthur Schopenhauer then to the teachings of the Catholic Church.

Reviews

[Jorge · Rating 4 out of 5]

Inspirado en el Filósofo alemán Arthur Schopenhauer (1788-1860), Joris-Karl Huysmans (1848-1907), nos regala esta pequeña y elocuente pieza literaria que nos habla acerca de lo estéril que resulta luchar contra las adversidades y las desventuras de la existencia humana.

El autor retrata el hastío, la inconformidad, los dolores, las decepciones de la existencia humana en el infausto Sr. Folantin quien se arrastra por todo París en busca revertir su vida llena de hastío y soledad.

Huysmans elabora este relato de una manera ligera, amena y con un gran sentido del humor, incluso con una especial mordacidad que nos saca una sonrisa cada 2 o 3 páginas.

Seguramente el autor ya entreveía el enorme fastidio y la angustia existencial provocados por el advenimiento de la modernidad con todas sus perniciosas consecuencias que suscitaron un desajuste entre el admirable progreso material y el declive espiritual.

Joris-Karl Huysmans pertenece a esa grandiosa generación de escritores franceses que colmaron el siglo XIX, sin embargo se ha visto opacado por otros grandísimos escritores del calibre de Zola, Maupassant, Hugo, Balzac y algunos más; sin embargo Huysmans es de esos genios que les basta una obra para pasar a la posteridad y esta obra fue “A Contracorriente”.

La vida de Huysmans fue especialmente interesante y hacia el final de ella fue a recalar a un monasterio de Benedictinos.

[Jonathan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Drifting is a short novella of about sixty pages and its subject is the relatively low-paid civil-servant, Jean Folantin. Although he is slightly better off than he was, his wages allow him just enough to pay the rent on his room and enough for his basic meals, but little else. As a bachelor his days are mostly taken up with finding his next meal. There are other worries, such as getting his washing done and heating his room but it is the quest to find some edible food at a reasonable price in Paris that is his main concern. Now this may sound like a miserable little book but it really isn't. Folantin is at heart quite optimistic but it's his situation that has beaten him down. We discover that he was born into a poor Parisian family and although he grows up to be intelligent he has low expectations from life.

The fact is that Jean Folantin was born in disastrous circumstances; the day his mother's lying-in came to an end, his father possessed nothing but a handful of coppers. An aunt, who though not a midwife was expert in that kind of work, helped bring forth the child, cleaning his face with butter and, to save money, powdering his thighs with some flour scraped from a crust of bread in lieu of talcum. "So you see, my boy, you come from humble stock," his Aunt Eudore would say, acquainting him of these petty details, and from an early age Jean didn't dare hope for any kind of good fortune in the future.

Folantin has no living relatives and all of his friends have either died, or worse, got married; he can look back on happier days, such as when he was in his early twenties, but even then it is tinged with sadness or regret. Although he now has a bit more money he finds he lacks the enthusiasm for much of life, especially sex.

Happy days! And to think that now he was a little richer, now that he could afford to graze in better pastures and wear himself out in cleaner beds, he no longer felt any desire. The money had come too late, now that no pleasure could seduce him.

Although Folantin makes the occasional effort to be more sociable he usually finds himself being irritated by other people. One of the more amusing episodes in the book is when Folantin strikes up a friendship with M. Martinet whom he had got to know whilst searching for some good food. Martinet persuades Folantin to go to a table d'hôte, a more communal eating experience than Folantin is used to; needless to say it is a disaster as the place is heaving with people, it is thick with tobacco smoke, they have to wait for ages for a table, which is covered with left-over food from the previous customers, and the food is terrible.

The food and the wine were certainly wretched enough, but what was even more wretched than the food and more wretched than the wine, was the company in the midst of which you were consuming it; there were the emaciated waitresses who brought the dishes, wizened women with unfriendly eyes and features that were sharp and severe. A feeling of complete powerlessness came over you as you looked at them; you felt conscious of being watched and you ate uneasily, with circumspection, not daring to leave gristle or skin for fear of a reprimand, and apprehensive about taking a second helping beneath those eyes that sized up your appetite, forcing it back into the depths of your belly.

Martinet then drags poor Folantin to the theatre which irritates him further. When Martinet suggests they meet up on a regular basis Folantin is almost rude in rejecting his offer of companionship. These experiences do, however, make Folantin appreciate being alone.

In another episode Folantin discovers a local place that offers a meal delivery service. He takes up the offer, all at a reasonable price, and gets so excited that he decides, as he will now be spending more time at home, to re-decorate his room. At first he is pleased with his meals and the service but it soon deteriorates to such a degree that he gives up on it.

Folantin is hard to please, he's bored with the world and things that had once brought him pleasure no longer satisfy him. It's difficult to determine whether he is just incredibly fussy or whether he is justified with his criticisms. If Folantin sounds similar to Huysmans' more well-known literary creation, Des Esseintes, from À rebours, then you are not alone as Huysmans noted, in an introductory piece in a later edition of À rebours that he saw Des Esseintes as a richer, more refined counterpart to Folantin. It has been a while since I read Against Nature but I much prefer the character of Folantin to Des Esseintes, as Folantin's situation lends itself more to humour and empathy. From what I can remember, Des Esseintes mostly annoyed me—though I would like to re-read it somewhen to see if I appreciate it more on a second-reading.

I found Drifting both charming and funny, but it is a dark humour that probably won't appeal to some readers. In the excellent introduction to the book it is mentioned that the book was largely dismissed by contemporary critics as being grim and pessimistic which rather surprised Huysmans who described his own work as humour noir.

[Ana Carvalheira · Rating 4 out of 5]

Mais um exemplo de acérrima misantropia e indiscutível misoginia, sempre presentes neste incrível autor que foi Joris-Karl Huysmans.

Para mim, não possuindo a intensidade a densidade dramática e psicológica de “Ao Arrepio” – que, ma minha perspetiva continua sendo a obra prima desse autor francês, nascido como Georges Charles Marie Huysmans -, este “À Deriva” também não deixa de nos surpreender.

E essa surpresa surge muito por força de uma prosa poderosa, como Huysmans já nos habituara, mas também pela atualidade das suas perspetivas. Creio que já afirmei e reafirmei em várias das minhas análises que o melhor que os autores clássicos nos trazem, consiste na atualidade das suas invetivas, dos seus ideais, das suas perspetivas como se a sociedade não tivesse evoluído um passo desde esses momentos.

“À Deriva” é uma novela que nos dá conta da vida de Jean Folatin, pequeno burguês que vive em Paris nos últimos decénios do século 19, não muito diferente da personagem de Des Esseintes, com a diferença de que este último decide instalar-se num palacete em Fontenay, vivendo na mais exaurível e voluntária solidão.

A única diferença que consigo destrinçar entre a personagem principal de “À Deriva” e a de “Ao Arrepio” consiste na opção que alguns de nós têm a sorte ou a infelicidade de aceder.

Somos todos seres solitários, mas ter a coragem de o assumir, não é para todos. Nem todos conseguem resguardar-se nessa solitude fazendo desse ato, algo de grande felicidade, de enorme rejubilação. Dentro dessa estrutura psicológica, acredito nem todos possam compreender o enorme peso da vida e evitá-lo como sendo a sua própria forma de redenção.

Acho impressionante como a forma que JKH desconstrói os pressupostos secularmente institucionalizados atendendo à época em que viveu. Parece que o autor está presente atualmente na nossa sociedade. Por outro lado, a personagem de Jean Folatin sofre de algo muito próprio dos tempos atuais: o tédio da rotina!! “Mecanicamente, sob o céu pluvioso, seguia para o seu escritório, deixava-o, comia e deitava-se ás nove horas para recomeçar, no dia a seguir, uma vida parecida; pouco a pouco, deslizava num entorpecimento absoluto do espírito”. Pouco a pouco, deslizava num entorpecimento absoluto do espírito … e assim a vida decorre até ao dia que em seremos chamados para uma dimensão superior. Pelo que passamos nesta existência, talvez tenhamos a ousadia de acreditar que essa nova dimensão nos trará alguma recompensa.

Voltando à narrativa, Huysmans, numa abordagem cínica, mas na qual me identifico revela-nos o seguinte: “Não, há que ser justo; cada situação tem as suas inquietações e arrelias; e depois é uma vileza, quando não se tem fortuna, só dar à luz a criançolas! E votá-las ao desprezo dos outros, quando forem grandes; é lança-las para uma luta infame, sem defesas e sem armas; é perseguir e castigar os inocentes a quem se impõe recomeçar a miserável vida dos pais”. Quem de nós não conhece pais que querem rever-se nos seus filhos, os seus próprios fracassos?

O ser capaz de se isolar, de experienciar uma vida solitária poderá, efetivamente, retificar a ordem instituída pelas convenções: as delícias do celibato, o facto de sermos nós próprios a prover as nossas necessidades, o se entender numa cama sem mais ninguém, tê-la só para nós retifica a ideia de que de como o “Casamento corta com tudo! Tinham-se tratado por tu, vivido a mesma existência, não podiam passar uns sem os outros, e no presente mal se cumprimentavam quando se reencontravam”. Não será esse o mal de todos os tempos?

Para finalizar, apenas algo também que me tocou profundamente … a influência de Schopenhauer, um dos meus influenciadores preferidos, quando o Huysmans nos recorda que “a vida do homem oscila como um pêndulo entre a dor e o tédio”.

[Inés De Hueso · Rating 4 out of 5]

Cada vez me gusta más cómo escribe Huysmans!!
Me gusta mucho cómo refleja el desasosiego. Además el protagonista es alguien con el que es perfectamente posible empatizar en las cosas de la vida que le han decepcionado.
Siempre da gusto leer una buena novela corta.

[None Ofyourbusiness Loves Israel · Rating 4 out of 5]

Wading through the murky waters of Huysmans' עם הזרם, I found myself swept along by the current of existential ennui that carries us through the underbelly of fin-de-siècle Paris.

The novella charts the downstream journey of Jean Folantin, a disillusioned civil servant whose spiritual and emotional emptiness mirrors the gray Seine that flows relentlessly through the narrative. "I am like a bottle emptied of everything but its sediment," Jean confesses in one of the novel's most striking passages, "floating wherever the tide takes me, neither fighting the current nor finding a shore on which to rest."

This aquatic metaphor—this fluid philosophy, if you will—permeates Huysmans' prose, which itself drifts between naturalistic observation and metaphysical contemplation with the languid movement of water seeking its level.

The hapless Jean Folantin—a minor bureaucrat with the constitution of a consumptive greyhound—wanders through Paris in search of a decent meal. His Sisyphean quest for edible food mirrors his larger existential nausea, as each bistro and cheap restaurant delivers not sustenance but revulsion: "The beef was like a cataplasm, the wine like ink mixed with vinegar." Folantin’s life is a litany of petty humiliations—landladies who pilfer his coal, colleagues who sneer at his threadbare coat, a city that grinds him down with its "odors of frying fat and unwashed humanity."

The very short storyline meanders through remarkably dispirited episodes. Beginning with his futile search for a decent meal in Parisian restaurants, where he encounters bland gravies and subpar dishes, reflecting the monotony of his life. His dissatisfaction extends to his work, where he makes errors due to distraction and endures the incessant chatter of a colleague, a little old man who recites the morning newspaper and critiques its language while offering unsolicited opinions on his own health, leaving M. Folantin mentally drained and forcing him to redo entire pages of work.

A brief moment of hope arises when he discovers a patisserie offering meal deliveries, but this quickly fades into disappointment as his optimism subsides. His reflections on marriage reveal his aversion to its burdens, while his musings on religion and faith expose a longing for solace that he feels incapable of attaining.

Encounters with women, including an awkward and intrusive interaction with a bold waitress who assumes he will pay for her meal and accompany her afterward, leave him flustered and eager to escape her advances. Similarly, during his solitary wanderings through Parisian streets, M. Folantin briefly converses with a prostitute but retreats out of discretion, fearing he might disrupt her potential clients. These moments highlight his internal conflict between carnal desires and his aversion to intimacy, further emphasizing his isolation and inability to form meaningful relationships.

Even small misfortunes, like returning to a cold, dark apartment with no matches or oil for his lamp, compound his despair. As he contemplates Schopenhauer’s philosophy of life oscillating between pain and boredom, he resigns himself to solitude, finding fleeting comfort only in the idea of retreating to bed.

Amidst these struggles, he envies the calm lives of others, regrets losing his faith, and laments the death of his last surviving relative, which deepens his sense of loneliness.

Despite moments of fleeting optimism, such as a sunny morning that briefly lifts his spirits, his attempts to combat hypochondria and improve his circumstances ultimately falter, leaving him entrenched in a cycle of resignation and despair.

Huysmans, a former civil servant himself, who began as Zola's disciple before bathing in the waters of symbolism and eventually immersing himself in Catholic mysticism, uses this transitional work to bridge the brackish confluence of naturalism and spirituality.

The emotional undertow of "Drifting" pulls readers into a whirlpool of questions about meaning in an increasingly mechanized world. The surprising revelation comes not in fighting against modern emptiness but in the protagonist's gradual acceptance of his role as witness to his time's spiritual drought. Unlike Huysmans' later conversion narratives or his earlier, more clinically naturalistic works, עם הזרם floats in the liminal space between resignation and awakening, reminiscent of Baudelaire's prose poems but with less aesthetic posturing and more raw despair.

The prescient modernism and psychological depth shine through the wonderful Hebrew translation of this brief novella. Ultimately, Huysmans doesn't merely describe his era's malaise but captures something timeless and universal: the paradoxical freedom found in surrendering to life's current, a freedom that arrives when one stops thrashing against the inevitable flow and instead becomes an acute observer of the passing shores. Like Jacques himself, who discovers that "the water that drowns us is the same water that might cleanse us," I found myself transformed by surrendering to its melancholy tide:

On the Nature of Life:
"Man’s life swings like a pendulum between pain and boredom."

On Resignation to Fate:
"You had to let yourself drift with the flow... all you can do is fold your arms and try to sleep."

On the Futility of Searching for Better Food:
"M. Folantin wondered if all the changing around was worth it, seeing that everywhere the wine was adulterated with lead oxide and diluted with pump water, the eggs were never cooked how you wanted them, the steaks always lacked juice, and the boiled vegetables looked like prison leftovers."

On the Transformation of Paris:
"Everything had vanished: no more clumps of foliage, no more trees, but interminable barracks stretching out as far as the eye could see; and in this new Paris M. Folantin suffered a sensation of unease and anguish."

On the Irony of Marriage:
"'But marriage is impossible at my age,' he would tell himself. 'Ah, if only I’d had a mistress when I was younger; had I kept her, I could see out my final years with her, I’d come home to find my lamp lit and my meals ready.'"

On the Misery of Dining Alone:
"Onto the still-warm tablecloth, amid breadcrumbs and spatters of gravy, their plates were flung down, and they were served a tough, leathery piece of beef and tasteless vegetables, a roast beef whose rubbery flesh bent under the knife, a salad and dessert."

On Proofreading Errors:
"Let’s try to ensure that there are neither slips nor typos, and that from this point of view our little baby will be without blemish."

Forgotten Alleyways:
"It amused him to stroll along these forgotten alleyways, these poor, provincial streets, to be amazed at the secrets its humble households revealed, glimpsed through ground-floor windows."

Paris Turning Sinister:
"There’s no doubt about it, Paris is turning into a sinister Chicago."

On Philosophy:
"Schopenhauer was right to say that the life of a man swings like a pendulum between pain and boredom."

On Despair:
"What good does it do me, what good does it do you, what good does it do us all, to be alive? What good did living do our ancestors, what good will living do our descendants?"

On Eating Out:
"If only I had a passion of some kind; if I loved women, or my work; if I liked coffee, dominoes or cards, I could eat out, because I’d never spend long enough at home."

On Religion:
"Yes, but why are the consolations of religion only fit for simpletons? Why did the Church want to elevate the most absurd beliefs into dogmatic truths?"

עם הזרם דומה למסעדה מפוקפקת בפונדק דרכים קיומי: התפריט מציע דיכאון ברוטב ניהיליסטי, מצולחת עם נגיעות של בדידות עירונית, ומוגש יחד עם קינוח של התפכחות מרירה. אחרי ששטפתי את כל המנה הזו בכוס יין ספרותי טוב וצ'ייסר של אבסינת סרטרי, גיליתי שטעמי הלוואי אינם של ייאוש, אלא של שחרור מוזר—כי לפעמים הדבר הכי חכם לעשות הוא פשוט... לצוף. כמו זבוב בקערת מרק בצל, גם ז'אן פולנטן מבין בסוף שאין טעם להילחם בזרם—החיים, הקידמה, רוחות ההיסטוריה כבר יזרימו אותך להיכנשהו. והספר הזה? הוא בן הזוג המושלם לתעייה בעיר הגדולה, בין אם אתה פקיד משועמם או סתם בריה שצריכה לתרץ בהייה בחלל ופיזור מחשבות. העיר פריז מככבת כאן במלוא הדרה ויגונה ועל המבקר בה ליטול את הדפים הללו באמתחתו להגברת האווירה. גם מי ששוקל דיאטה, או חושב להזמין משלוח וולט ממסעדה צריך לקרוא את הספר הזה לפני שהוא לוחץ על כפתור 'הזמן'. מומלץ בחום (או יותר נכון—בקור הפנימי של פריז הקודרת).

זהו באמת ספר של חמישה כוכבים אבל הוא כל כך קצר (קראתי אותו בעברית ושוב באנגלית באחר צהריים אחד), שלא היה נעים לי מאלו שהשקיעו וכתבו יצירות מופת בנות מאות עמודים, לכן הוא מקבל רק ארבעה.

[Eadweard · Rating 4 out of 5]

Spleen and Ennui: À Reboirs Lite from another perspective.

[Cody · Rating 3 out of 5]

Mostly important as the final novel before Year Zero of Decadence as a school (via Against Nature). J.-K. is almost there, he surely hates everything, and this is the transitory pivot from Naturalism into, well, the reason I love Huysmans. You don't see many Zola books on these shelves for a reason.

[Antônio Xerxenesky · Rating 4 out of 5]

Como eu amo esse desgracento

[Zek · Rating 2 out of 5]

ספר משעמם ביותר על אדם משעמם ביותר

[Ms.Manzarek · Rating 5 out of 5]

¿Saben lo que es pensar: joder, me están leyendo la mente? Pues eso. Delicioso y decadente. ¡Ay el ennui, el pesimismo práctico! ¡Ay Huysmans! 🖤 Este es el inicio de una gran amistad.

📌Me despido con estas perlas:
🔸"Folantin, flâneur, más funcionario que poeta, que mientras trabaja se imagina dando paseos, se encuentra desubicado en aquella nueva ciudad de espíritu napoleónico. Un París ideado por el urbanista barón Haussmann, quien sustituyó las callejuelas, antítesis de la aburrida simetría, por los grandes bulevares, apoteosis, en palabras de Benjamin, del señorío mundano y espiritual de la burguesía."

🔸"«Demasiado tarde…, mi virilidad está ya agotada, el matrimonio es imposible. Definitivamente mi vida es un fracaso. Lo mejor que puedo hacer —suspiró el Sr. Folantin— es acostarme y dormir»".

🔸"¿Qué hacer? La semana se podía pasar, pero lo que verdaderamente le pesaba eran los domingos. [...] Había, pues, desistido de pasear los domingos entre el lujo de mal gusto que lo invadía todo, incluso los barrios de las afueras. [...] ¡ay!, ¡el domingo se hacía interminable!"

🔸"Comprendió la inutilidad de los cambios de ruta, la esterilidad de los arranques y de los esfuerzos; «lo que hay que hacer es dejarse ir a la deriva; Schopenhauer tiene razón."

[Matthew Gallaway · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is not the place to start with Huysmans, but is more like a B-side for those who can't get enough of "Against the Grain." (I am one of those people.) The British translation gets annoying at times, but it's completely worth the hour or so it takes to read for the description of finding a restaurant that delivers.

[Sam · Rating 5 out of 5]

a modestly perfect book

[Raúl · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fantástica.Una obra que se anticipa a algunos clásicos del siglo XX.

[Oleksandr Fediienko · Rating 3 out of 5]

Жан Фолантен у свої сорок років працює клерком у Парижі. Він вийшов з незаможної родини і тільки зараз підняв свій фінансовий рівень. Але все одно він залишається майже ні з чим. Всі близькі родичі вже померли, друзі розійшлися, жінки немає. Він день у день прожовує своє життя, як ті гумові стейки, які він завжди їсть на вечерю – здається, в Парижі розучились добре готувати.
Це оповідання настільки схоже на «Навпаки». І водночас ні. Звісно, Фолантен витрачає останні гроші на нові шпалери, штори і картини, а дез Ессент з роману «Навпаки» живе в маєтку. Люди зовсім різні. Проте обох їх втомило життя. Вони насилу знаходяться в ньому щось приємне, але їхнє духовне відродження нетривале, дуже скоро вони знову махають на все рукою. І все ж вони надто різні. Сподіваюся ще колись повернутися до дез Ессента і розповісти про нього.

[Tighy · Rating 4 out of 5]

Această scurtă scriere te coboară în interiorul melancoliei și a plictisului. Este un cântec al nihilismului cu sclipiri de veselie sinistră cuvântat de un spirit feroce și care se termină, destul de logic, în resemnare, în a lăsa lucrurile să plutească de la sine. O liturghie a mizeriilor cotidiene.

[Simon Julius Renatus Vermeulen · Rating 3 out of 5]

Cynisme ten top in deze rake schets van een ongelukkig typetje dat een uitzichtloos bestaan als ambtenaar leidt in het Parijs van twee eeuwen terug. Niets lukt, alles is triest, en hij is ook nog eens mank.

[WillemC · Rating 5 out of 5]

Ambtenaar Folantin zit vast in een sleur: zijn werk steekt tegen, zijn dichtste collega zaagt te veel en het eten op restaurant smaakt niet meer. Krampachtig probeert hij los te breken uit zijn routine: nieuwe eetgelegenheden uitproberen, nieuwe boeken kopen, nieuwe mensen leren kennen. Wanneer niets van dat alles hem kan bekoren, legt hij er zich maar bij neer en vervalt hij in zijn oude leven. "Op drift" is een novelle vol walging, stank, zinloosheid en vervreemding, die door de focus op Folantins voortdurende mislukking grappig wordt: anders dan bij zijn vroege, meer naturalistische werk schetst Huysmans hier geen triest figuur waar we medelijden moeten mee hebben, maar eerder een komisch type "verloren gelopen grootstadsmens" wiens tegenslagen op de lachspieren werken. Na een jaar of zeven nog eens herlezen, ik blijf fan! Negentiende-eeuwse literatuur die door de thematiek twintigste-eeuws aanvoelt.

"[...] ineens besefte hij hoe zinloos het was om steeds weer andere dingen te proberen, ergens warm voor te lopen of zijn best voor te doen. Je moet je maar met de stroom mee laten drijven; Schopenhauer heeft gelijk, dacht hij, 'het leven van de mens gaat als een slinger heen en weer tussen verdriet en verveling.' Het loont eigenlijk niet de moeite om de slinger te willen vertragen of versnellen: je kunt maar beter het beste met je armen over elkaar gaan zitten en proberen in slaap te komen."

[S̶e̶a̶n̶ · Rating 3 out of 5]

This novella chronicles a year in the life of a depressive clerk desperate for a decent cheap meal. The bachelor M. Folantin's moods shift with the seasons. As spring approaches, he feels hopeful, determined to break his solitude and reach out to the world (and find somewhere new to eat). He renews a lapsed acquaintanceship but soon realizes it was not worth renewal. He finds a restaurant that delivers and believes for a moment that his dream has finally come to fruition--an affordable delicious meal he can enjoy in the comfort of his lodgings! But it is too good to be true for long, as the quality of the food and the mode of delivery worsens at a rapid pace. In the face of these thwarted efforts, his hope withers. Nothing ever improves for good, and now winter is here again...

[Michal · Rating 4 out of 5]

בפחות מ 100 עמודים, כל מי שבדיכאון יכול להזדהות עם הגיבור. כמו שהגיבור מסכם בסוף הספר "אין טעם לנסות דרכים חדשות, וההיפתחות והמאמצים כולם לשווא; מוטב להיסחף עם הזרם....אין אלא לשלב ידיים ולנסות לישון."

[Alan Francisco · Rating 4 out of 5]

A la deriva de Joris Karl Huysmans es una novela sobre la parálisis. Me recuerda a Dubliners de James Joyce, debido al que protagonista experimenta una especie de parálisis el cual quiere romper por medio del flanerismo. Jean Folantin es un funcionario como cualquier otro, ni le va mal ni le va bien; gana un dinero decente; vive en un lugar normal y lleva años en su función. Su vida fue triste, pero nada del otro mundo, se les fueron sus dos padres. Primero su padre cuando era joven y después su madre justo en el momento que consiguió su trabajo después de matarse por años para que Jean tuviera una buena educación. Jean se pasa todo el tiempo libre entre prostitutas y restaurantes.
Un día el decide cambiar su vida, debido a que siente un hastío muy fuerte por su persona y su vida. Emprende una serie de caminatas por Paris y por el Sena, pero Paris y el Sena no son el mismo. Paris ha cambiado, se ha americanizado, ha perdido lo sagrado; todo se ha vuelto callejones sin belleza ni pasión. Este es unos de los temas principales de los autores franceses de esta época, debido a que el desarrollo industrial de Paris ha arrancado, por así decir, las raíces de un mundo más artesanal, más íntimo y lo ha reemplazado con el mundo urbano, el cual es alienante y sombrío. Jean trata de buscar sentido en este París, trata de encontrar valor en libros viejos de los quioscos alrededor del Sena, y sobre todo busca por comida que no sea insípida en los restaurantes y en los bodegones. Todo esto es inútil, porqué él es un ser extraño a todo esto, él está detached de todo esto.
Al final del libro, recibe la noticia de que su tía monja murió y empieza a reflexionar sobre como el quisiera tener algo de fe, y que la fe es lo único que puede sacar sentido en un mundo como este, pero el, lamentablemente, no tiene esa fe. El está perdido. Yo leí una vez como el flanneur era un contramovimiento contra esta industrialización y desacralización de Paris, eran sujetos que, resumidamente por Baudelaire, si la industrialización es el bien, nosotros somos las flores del mal. Otro lugar simbólico para Jean es la Place Saint Sulpice, una plaza que es la única que se mantiene igual a como era cuando el era joven, la única que no ha sido desacralizada.
Al final del texto, él se rinde, la parálisis gana, y finaliza con la máxima de Schopenhauer de que la vida es solo hastío y dolor, therefore¸ uno solo puede vivir “a la deriva”. Esto para mi es una forma de aceptar la parálisis, aceptar la mediocridad de su vida, y aceptar que la vida no tiene sentido. Todo esto anticipa la literatura existencialista de Camus y de Sartre, pero hay algo diferente, algo sagrado. Para Jean, la religión es la única forma de salvar la humanidad, pero trágicamente, no hay forma de volver a ella. Estamos, inevitablemente, “a la deriva”.

[Eamonn Wilcox · Rating 3 out of 5]

saw this random on shelf at parent house and read in one go, it is curious, intriguingly funny.
depressed man, no friends or family really, all he looks forward to is where to eat dinner every night, but all restaurants around him are bad.

man is talking bout how all the independent bookstores and antique stores in paris are being taken over by expensive cafes and paris is turning into a sinister chicago.

in 1880. lol

some quite profound/well conveyed sentences throughout

having a sunday off work, relaxing, but then it turn to dread around 5pm once all tasks are done and are a lonely man, etc.

modulating his opinion every other second on whether his married ppl are happier than him, if should have lived life differently even tho i think he is like 33 etc as well.

being jolted out of his rut because new cafe on his street is offering delivery, which i didnt know existed then, this excites him and creates a chain reaction of other things he suddenly realizes he wants to do, etc as well too.

and quips about spiders being friends w house cleaners who are bad at their jobs and do not dust thoroughly, etc as well too and so on

[Chik67 · Rating 2 out of 5]

Per capire megliol'Huysmans di Controcorrente aiuta molto leggere questo Huysmans che segue la corrente. Nella corrente, trasportati dal flusso, nessun estetismo deadente: tutto è squallidamente brutto. Cattivo il cibo: freddo, acido, di scarsa qualità, sporco. Mediocre il sesso: mercenario e fatto mal volentieri. Pessimo il lavoro: ripetitivo, privo di soddisfazioni, poco renumerativo. Brutti gli appartamenti. Piovose e lercie le strade. Nulla si salva. Nella storia senza sviluppo di quest'omino che arriva ad accettare questa vita deprimente c'è il contraltare del dandy Des Esseintes che cerca in tutti modi di sfuggirci.
Questo, però, alla fine mi mette Huysmans nella sua giusta luce. Un borghesuccio piccolo, piccolo, che si lamenta della scompasa delle mezze stagioni e che usa l'eccezionale come scusa per il suo difficile rapporto con il reale.
Non mi stupisco, allora, che Houllebecq ne abbia fatto l'eroe di rimbalzo di un altro libro (per me mediocre) che puzza di borghesia piccina picciò. Grazie, no. Il moralismo da cucina con la letteratura ha poco a che fare.

[Jeff French · Rating 4 out of 5]

It's hard to fathom, but Huysmans' early works strike me as a kind of gloomy Zola (!). A Vau l'eau doesn't really have much in the way of plot, as very little happens, but it is more a look at the daily life of his hero, Follatin: a lonely and dreary existence highlighted by his search for a good meal (beef with the consistency of the sole of a boot). An acquaintance who tries to befriend Follatin is boring; an encounter with a prostitute is simply boring, and in the end, Follatin decides that life is like a pendulum swinging between pain and boredom and the best way to live life is to just "go with the flow,: (I.e., a Vau l'eau). This book is a great, short introduction to the beginnings of the naturalist movement well before Huysmans starts his turn towards the occult and spiritualism.

[Lyle · Rating 4 out of 5]

I much preferred this to À Rebours (though the latter is decidedly more mature and well-constructed in a few senses, I found it extremely boring and a book better to read about than to read), and this has some great moments and in my opinion a much more interesting and better written characterization, so despite some, in my opinion, pretty tough shortcomings, it’s a real shame that if I can judge by the one other book of Huysmans I’ve read so far, his writing did not improve after this to truly great heights, but instead deteriorated.

[Troy S · Rating 3 out of 5]

I have to give a round of applause to the translator here, between his introduction and some incredibly informative and fascinating footnotes I found myself much more intrigued and impressed by the possibility and context of this book's existence. I did find Drifting rather dull, with it's best parts paraphrasing and applying the works of Schopenhauer to the life of a lonesome, shy bachelor. It did have some very interesting anthropological scenes with fin de siecle sex workers, but that was probably due in great part to the translator footnotes about syphilis.

[Faust · Rating 5 out of 5]

Musings of a profoundly dispirited man.

A bleak stream of life seeks to carry monsieur Folantin away, yet he swims pathetically.

Out of all his feeble attempts to find solace, I found the sudden need for aesthetic intervention in his home and his contemplation of faith particularly interesting; for Beauty and Divinity are two edges of the sword which (in the right hand) can slay the beast of modernity.

Our unfortunate protagonist, however, was not of the appropriate stock to wield this blade. And as the last sentence flows through, we leave him to drift away.

[Alejandro G. Barroso · Rating 4 out of 5]

El desencanto hacia un mundo echado a perder guía las pocas páginas de esta novela, que son las que merece un mundo que ha evolucionado a la estupidez y el mal gusto. Si el protagonista de las Memorias del subsuelo de Dostoyevski hubiera salido a la calle, hubiera hablado como habla el de A la deriva que ve cómo París deja de ser París, y se infecta de la peste del pesimismo, tan alemán como ruso.

[Andrés · Rating 4 out of 5]

"Et mélancoliquement il se répéta en retournant chez lui, la plante désespérée de Karamzine: « À quoi bon, moi, à quoi bon toi ; à quoi bon nous tous, vivons-nous ? à quoi bon vécurent nos aïeux, à quoi bon vivront nos descendants ? » Mon âme est épuisée, faible et triste".

[Ben Koops · Rating 3 out of 5]

Heerlijk broddelend boek over een heer op leeftijd die nog even probeert om boven zijn stand te leven. Hier en daar echo's van Bove maar in plaats van melancholie is hier een soort verkneukelen over de vrij absurde gang van zaken.

[Gertrudis Fortinbras · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.5