Conversations with Professor Y (French Literature Series) [Paperback]

Louis-Ferdinand Céline (Author), Stanford Luce (Translator)

Book Description

Series: French Literature Series | Publication Date: July 1, 2006

"Here's the truth, simply stated . . . bookstores are suffering from a serious crisis of falling sales."

So begins the imaginary interview that comprises this novel. Professor Y, the interviewing academic, asks questions that allow Céline, a character in his own book, the chance to rail against convention and defend his idiosyncratic methods. In the course of their outrageous interplay, Céline comes closer to defining and justifying his poetics than in any of his other novels. But this is more than just an interview. As the book moves forward, Professor Y reveals his real identity and the characters travel through the streets of Paris toward a bizarre climax that parodies the author, the critic, and, most of all, the establishment.

Editorial Reviews

Review

His eloquent gueule, or bad mouth, recognizably shocked and energized the language to a new vitality. Luce's savvy translation brings this idiosyncratic, demonically streetwise culture guru to life for English-speaking readers. (Publishers Weekly )

Conversations with Professor Y is an eminently satisfying reading experience. (Queen''s Quarterly )

Language Notes

Text: English, French --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 156 pages
• Publisher: Dalkey Archive Press (July 1, 2006)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1564784495
• ISBN-13: 978-1564784490
• Product Dimensions: 8.5 x 5.6 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 8.8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #862,837 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

19 of 19 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars To the Skies...!, January 23, 2001

By 

[e-mail] (PARISFRANCE) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Conversations with Professor Y Bilingual ed (Hardcover)

In 1944, Louis-Ferdinand Celine, the author of the novels ''Journey to the End of the Night'' and ''Death on the Installment Plan,'' fled his native France. In the preceding decade he had written pamphlets blaming the impending war on industrialists, literary figures, politicians and Jews. His anti-Semitism became increasingly virulent, when the Occupation years ended in 1945 he went into exile in Denmark, where he was imprisoned for over a year for collaborating with the Nazis. Given amnesty by France in 1951, Celine returned, and found that his work was largely ignored.

In ''Conversations with Professor Y'' he set out to restore his reputation as an innovative literary stylist. The book appears here in English for the first time, alongside the French text, in a solid translation. Professor Y is a fictional foil for the author's digs at formal literature, and much of ''Conversations'' is hilarious. Celine is self-mocking as he tries to get his name back into circulation. He compares an eager genius to the new Big Bubbly soap product, is adamant in his revulsion at the ascendancy of ideas over emotion and is passionate in his desire to capture the immediacy of conversation on the page. ''The emotion of spoken language through the written form! Just reflect on that a bit, dear Professor Y! get your noodle in gear!'' Poor Professor Y! This dull academician (whose most intelligent comment is ''Why, holy moly! you're afloat in dialectics!'') is led on a dizzying tour of Paris, overwhelmed by a crazed author who claims he's on the brink of a revelation just when the professor expresses a need to find a bathroom. ''Conversations''is essential for Celine fans, and a good, if tame, introduction for the uninitiated.

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Welcome to exclamation marks!, July 31, 2009

By 

Exordia N. (Iowa City, Iowa USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Conversations with Professor Y (French Literature Series) (Paperback)

He influenced writers such as Jack Kerouac, Charles Bukowski, and Kurt Vonnegut. Who is he? Louis-Ferdinand Celine! Changed French literature completely with his emotive invention: to capture the emotion of oral language through the written form! It is a high energy book. Outrageous! Bold! Punctual! No exclamation marks used as excessively and as optimistically as Celine has done with this book. Nor with... three periods in a row! Using the metro as the metaphor, vehicle, breakthrough, epiphany for his invention. I read the book in one sitting! Difficult to put down. Conversations with Professor Y is about conversations with Professor Y about the birthing of his literary invention. This style. The metro. The rail. This was the first part of the novel. The second part accounts the breakdown of Professor Y as Celine takes Professor Y back to his own publisher [Gallimard]. Not before taking the taxi, buying roses and lilies, peeing!

8 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Style MisRepresented, March 26, 1998

By A Customer

This review is from: Conversations with Professor Y Bilingual ed (Hardcover)

Conversations is an easy and short read...in the text we find Celine describing his 'style'--the "emotive subway" as he called it...there are funny episodes and attacks on publishers and whoever gets in his way, I would recommend it along with 'Mea Culpa'...one can gather what Celine was composed of more with insights such as this!...