Down There (La-Bas) (Paperback)

from slickdpdx

A learned paranoid Catholic and Satanic adventure novel with a longing for the good old days - as in, the dark ages. It is apparent to me that Huysmans decided to end this just as it was nearing its climax. The night I finished the book, I dreamt of a small black volume that contained the missing...

from judithrs

La Bas (Down There or The Damned). J.K. Huysman. 1891. This is a book I wish I hadn't read. It is the first title in a series, and I saw a reference to the second title, En Route, on a Catholic site about conversion. I was intrigued because it was set in France. As I downloaded En Route, I saw th...

from jonfaith

The best one can do is point to Dostoevsky . . . as providing the closest approximation to such an ideal. Yet even that amenable Russian is more an evangelical socialist than an enraptured realist. In France, now that the purely physical recipe has fallen into such discredit, two clans have emerg...

from Eustrabirbeonne

Each star stands for one favourite fragment : the description of Grünewald 's Crucifixion (the memory of this passage caused me to take the 7-hour train trip from Paris to Colmar, mostly to see the Unterlinden version) and the delightful dinner with the Carhaix couple (chapter V). Otherwise the n...

from colligan

La-Bas was, for me at least, a great disappointment. The writing was competent but not noteworthy. The plot was predictable and the characters little more than caricatures. The books primary value is probably as popular history. The "depraved" events described have little impact on modern readers...