Foam of the Daze [Paperback]

Boris Vian (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: November 1, 2003

L'Ecume des jours (Foam of the Daze) is a jazz fueled Science Fiction story that is both romantic and nihilistic! Vian's novel is an assortment of bittersweet romance, absurdity and the frailty of life. Foam of the Daze is a nimble-fingered masterpiece that is both witty and incredibly moving. It is a story of a wealthy young man Colin and the love of his life Chloe, who develops a water lily in her lung. The supporting cast includes Chick, an obsessive collector of noted philosopher Jean-Sol Partre's books and stained pants, and Nicolas who is a combination of P.G. Wodehouse's fictional butler Jeeves and the Green Hornet's Kato. The soul of the book is about the nature of life disappearing and loving things intensely as if one was making love on a live grenade!

Editorial Reviews

Review

"(Vian) has been canonized by a whole generation of revolutionary young people...this fantasy of perishing purity is an affirmation of youth and innocence, laced with the biting humor of Jacques Prévert and Ionesco." --Newsweek

"The most heartbreakingly poignant modern love story ever written." --Raymond Queneau

Foam of the Daze is a novel like no other, a sexy, innocent, smart and sweet cartoon of a world which then begins, little by little, to bleed real blood until, in the end, the blood turns out to be our own. I read it nearly thirty years ago in its previous incarnation as Mood Indigo and I loved it then; it's still one of my favorite books in the whole world. --Jim Krusoe

About the Author

The definition of Boris Vian: engineer, inventor, chronicler of jazz, trumpet player, poet and novelist, creator of spectacles, lyric writer and singer, and of course pataphysician.

Product Details

• Paperback: 261 pages
• Publisher: TamTam Books (November 1, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0966234634
• ISBN-13: 978-0966234633
• Product Dimensions: 8.5 x 5.5 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 11.5 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #95,150 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #99 in Books > Literature & Fiction > Genre Fiction > Metaphysical

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

26 of 27 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Review from the Los Angeles Times (Feb 1, 2004), June 22, 2004

By A Customer

This review is from: Foam of the Daze (Paperback)

A legend throughout Europe - French musician, translator of Raymond Chandler and seminal science fiction writer, poet, songwriter, novelist and screen actor - Boris Vian remains little known in the United States. Los Angeles-based TamTam Book aims to correct this, having published a paperback edition of Vian's landmark thriller "I Spit on Your Graves" in 2001 and now a new translation of his masterful "Foam of the Daze" (L'Ecume des jours"), with the first translation of "L'Automne à Pékin" to follow.

There have been two previous English translations of "Foam": Stanley Chapman's 1967 British edition, "Froth on the Daydream," and Jon Sturrock's U.S. version, "Mood Indigo," which appeared shortly thereafter. Chapman's is by far the superior, admirably transposing Vian's rhythms into English and finding equivalents for his multi-level puns and wordplay. But Brian Harper's hip new translation, edged toward the modern U.S. reader, may well become the standard.

This is a great novel, mind you. Though on its surface, the simplest of stories - Vian summed it up as "a man loves a woman, she falls ill, she dies" - beneath are a host of ambiguities, digressions, levels of meaning. Not quite beneath actually, for subtexts keep erupting to the surface. It is in many ways a novel built of eruptions.

Simply, then, this is a tale of two couples: Colin, a rich and rather superfluous man, and Chloe, a woman dying from a lily growing in her lung; Chick, whose life is ruined by his collecting of Jean-Sol Partre's books and memorabilia, and Alise, who tries to save Chick from himself by murdering Partre. As the lily grows in Chloe's lung, Colin does all he can to keep her alive. But her bed sinks closer to the ground and the room grows ever smaller. Because Colin has no money left to pay for burial, Chloe's coffin is simply thrown out the window.

In Vian's world, nothing is simple, nothing may be taken for granted. Because people they love have died, mice persuade diffident cats to kill them; bells detach themselves from doors to come and announce visitors; neckties rebel against being knotted; some broken windowpanes grow back overnight while others darken from breathing difficulties; a piano mixes cocktails to match the music being played upon it; armchairs and sausages must be calmed before use. When Colin puts Duke Ellington's "The Mood to Be Wooed" on the phonograph, the O's on the record label cause the corners of the room to become round.

In Vian's books, the world becomes ineluctably strange, the world as a child or a madman might see it. And that's the recipe for "Foam of the Daze," a novel with paradox at its heart, as critic David Meakin has observed: one part light-hearted fantasy, one part tragedy. Add wordplay and romance to taste. Your heart will be broken. You will be confused and confounded. You will laugh aloud. And at least for a time, however hard you try, your own world will refuse to be what you think it is.

Here is Colin in church after Chloe's death:
"Why did you have her die?" asked Colin.
Oh... said Jesus, drop the subject.
He looked for a more comfortable position on his nails.
She was so sweet, said Colin. Never was she bad, neither in thought, nor in action.
That has nothing to do with religion, mumbled Jesus, yawning. He shook his head a little to change the slant of his crown of thorns.
I don't see what we've done, said Colin, we don't deserve this.

He lowered his eyes... Jesus's chest was rising softly and regularly, his features breathed calm, his eyes had closed and Colin could hear a light purr of satisfaction coming from his nostrils, like a sated cat."

Vian died June 23, 1959, at 39 as he sat watching a film version of his thriller "I Spit on Your Graves." He'd neglected to take his heart medications that morning and as the first frames ticked by on screen, he is said to have uttered, "These guys are supposed to be American? My ass!" and collapsed.

Vian's was a short, very full, very strange ride, like that of his ever-youthful characters in "Foam of the Daze."

James Sallis, Los Angeles Times Book Review (Sunday, February 1, 2004).

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars WOW, September 30, 2004

By 

GIndjeian "gindjeian" (Mexico) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Foam of the Daze (Paperback)

I will put it in a simple way: I have read and re-read this book in French, in Spanish and now in English more than fifty times and still find it to be the best love story ever told. Vian characters are straight, pure, honest and passionate in a way that we only can dream about. They are so full of life that you can actually cry when they die (I know, sound commonplace, but how often do you really mourn a character?). Vian draws this paradox of life and death better than anyone I know. Oh, you may wonder why I've read this book so many times... well, you know, Vian is actually telling you a different story every time you lay eyes into this book of marvels. Another commonplace would be to say that your life will change dramatically after reading this book. Ok, don't take my word, just go for it yourself. And, if you can, share your thoughts...

5.0 out of 5 stars A little known classic of 20th century fiction, February 15, 2010

By 

Pavel Cerny "Oscar in Hollywood" (CA, USA) - See all my reviews
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Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Foam of the Daze (Paperback)

I read the Boris Vian book when I was a college student. It was one of the most beautifully written books of modern fiction. It was right up there with Kafka, Proust, Bieliy, and Mayerink. Now I purchased it for my son. Read it for its poetry of language.