Rating: 
Summary: Historically Notable But A Stale Read Today
Review: One of the problems with reading revolutionary books long after their initial publication is that they often don't seem so, well... revolutionary. Such is the case with Céline's semi-autobiographical masterpiece-a 440 page behemoth that despite lively scenes here and there is very often tedious and boring. I gather that much of the controversy around it at the time was with regards to its use of "naturalistic" and "vulgar" language and slang (perhaps akin to the love/hate critical reaction to Scottish authors like James Kelman and Irvine Welsh in the late part of the century). While it may have represented a profound stick in the eye of literary conventions back in 1932, it certainly hasn't retained any capacity to shock or surprise in that regard. If you're a fan of the dark side of 20th century popular literature as represented by those such as Henry Miller, Bukowski, Kerouac, Burroughs, Vonnegut, Joseph Heller, et al (notice that you'll find no women on this list), you find it an interesting read just to see where they got some of their sensibilities, but otherwise it gets old fast.The problem with the book is not that there aren't commendable sentiments expressed at times. The opening section where the hero Bardamu enlists in WWI provides many ripe target for Céline to skewer. Similarly, the subsequent section on his adventures in colonial Africa are tailor-made to set up long bouts of righteous ranting and farcical satire (Although everything is based on his own experiences, at times one gets the feeling Céline read Conrad's "Heart of Darkness" a few too many times). Throughout the adventures, the hero Bardamu rants continuously about how
everyone is engaged in selling themselves and being false in order to prosper-that modern life is a lie, underneath it all, it's disgusting, that people are disgusting. It should be noted that the only two characters who aren't subject to Bardamu's withering scorn are the two truly selfless ones: the prostitute in Detroit who tries desperately to help him, and the guy at the end who does everything to send money to an orphaned niece. Céline acknowledges that these people exist (barely), but seems unable to know what to do with them-other than not sneer at them. Yes it's a dark, black read that holds nothing sacred. Is it life-changing? Certainly not for me, and I'd be hard pressed to understand how it could be for any reasonably intelligent, critically thinking person today. In the 1930s maybe, but today? In the end the book reminded me of nothing so much as The Catcher in the Rye, another book I find dated and overrated to the extreme.
Rating: 
Summary: A Mad, Brilliant Classic.
Review: Every lit major in America should read this wholly original and hilariously mad novel from Celine. A certifiably classic piece of literature. And influential to this day to boot. DEATH ON THE INSTALLMENT PLAN is not as good, but still worth a shot. No wonder Bukowski loved this guy!!
Rating:
Summary: War & Africa , New York...Paris
Review: This book is analyzed a lot for two reasons: 1) its writing style which feels closer to life than previous styles of literature, 2) its narrator's personality,not your conventional hero. It is very readable and enjoyable and in fact contains one of the most interesting accounts of World War I, "over our heads, two millimeters, maybe one millimeter from our temples, those long tempting lines of steel, that bullets make when they're out to kill you, were whistling through the hot summer air." Celine's character Bardamu is very funny and may remind some of Diderot's Rameau and perhaps he is a Rameau for the modern age. He calls a thing exactly as he sees it. The war chapters are my favorite for their strange blend of humor and absolute sobriety in the face of death , those bullets keep coming at Bardamu but he performs well and even becomes a corporal. It's not all fun and games for Bardamu of course, and there are moments of true humanity which stay with you as well as moments of real fear when under attack. The next phase of Bardamu's career takes him to Africa and there he spends what amounts to about 40 pages of time in a state of fever...hacking through jungle, jungle noises, butterflies, hacking through more jungle, riding in a dugout. Then to New York: 'we couldn't help laughing seeing it right there in front of us'. Bardamu roams the New York streets in awe, in his own special dream and eventually meets Molly, but soon he must go back to Paris and begin making a living of some kind. The parting scene with Molly is one of the more moving scenes in the book and there are quite a few. I suppose this kind of writing is called picaresque(episodic adventures of a roquish protagonist)but Bardamu is really very likable and very moved by much though he defends himself with humor and cynicism. The last part of the book in the slums of Paris is not as much fun as the earlier episodes but the writing is strong all the way through. Celine is smart and funny and irreverent toward everything, the language and humor and sometimes unexpected moments of compassion and feeling are exciting to read and all of it has a punch you won't forget as this is really good fiction that has lasted for good reason. You will enjoy following Bardamu on his adventures.
Rating:
Summary: Give Celine to the Dogs!
Review: After pouring over the comparisons to Henry Miller, Philip Roth, Jean-Paul Sartre, Jack Kerouac, and William Burroughs, it is evident that people have no idea what they are talking about. Celine was in a class all to himself, he created a highly unique style that still has not been imitated. 'Journey' will always be a work of art, a cacophony of rigor that tears the soul apart. Isn't it ironic that those commonplace Best books of the Century lists don't even mention Celine? Get real, get a copy of "Journey" to appreciate great literature!
Rating: 
Summary: Journey to the end of the night
Review: I have to admit that after reading this book and its follow on "I am a masochist." From the start, it is almost impossible to describe the levels of self debasement Celine puts his character through. The direction that any chain of events will follow is clear after the first three sequences. Down! In most cases they don't start on a very high plane. I don't believe for a minute that the scenarios pulled screaming from Celines mind are something the reader will carry with him / her after having have thrown the book down in disgust. The general feeling, yes, anything else, no. The writing style, at least as translated, is a slow go. As to why I finished it, the first sentence is my confession and excuse. There was something that held me. The friend who recommended kept asking, "weren't they funny?" To that I can state, for me a resounding "NO". He asked, "Were they good?" The answer to that is given above.
Rating:
Summary: Rock On, Celine.
Review: For those of you who like to see people as the crumbs they are...pick up this book. Celine unveils mankind in it's fat and greasy nakedness, causing us to flinch with apprehensive repose. Describing his voyages to the Congo aboard a ship surrounded by "fetid pools, crabs, carrion, and turds," Celine grabs us by the scruff of the neck and shows us the stuff mankind is made of. 'Nuff said.
Rating: 
Summary: Better than Miller
Review: Celine is often lumped together with Henry Miller (who admired him), but Celine is the better writer, at least in Journey to the End of the Night. (And in Ralph Manheim's translation.) Like Miller, Celine writes about Paris and his relations with women. However Celine was a soldier and a doctor and saw much more of life and Paris than Miller ever did. This is a funny and sad novel that was very influential and, in fact, inspired Joseph Heller to write Catch 22.
Rating:
Summary: Great!
Review: He writes like a live wire, crackling and wayward, full of hidden danger.
Rating:
Summary: Grossly overrated
Review: Celine belongs to the school of such literary dynamitards as Lautremont and Henry Miller. "Journey Into the End of the Night", which has been acclaimed as one of the most subversive and radical books of the twentieth century, however, fails to match either Lautremont or Miller in terms of content or style. Though it's fuelled by the same spirit of discontent and loathing of humanity, Celine's effort is an unmistakably drab and plodding in comparison. His writing fails to exude the aroma of malice so potently diffused by the "Chants du Maldoror"; nor does it measure up to the pyrotechnic displays of imagery that characterise Miller's "Tropic of Cancer". Those who expect the same of Celine will be sorely disappointed. The wearisome plot involves the reflections and tribulations of an insipid hero as he progresses from being a corporal in the First World War, onto his experiences in French colonial Africa and his poverty in Europe and America. All this is told in the driest prose, through 400+ pages that duly tax the reader's attention. Celine's descriptions of war, greed, folly and degradation sound as those of a man of the left, though he was eventually to become a vehement right-winger (like so many men of his generation) and an apologist of Nazism. Not only does his writing not reach the scale and quality of Miller, his descriptions of disease and atrocity in the tropics are even surpassed by the likes of such pro-Establishment birds as Joseph Conrad in his "Heart of Darkness"; similarly, his account of poverty is far inferior to George Orwell's "Down and Out in Paris and London". It is mystifying how such an incorrigibly poor writer could have risen to a position of such importance among lterary critics and connossieurs.
Rating:
Summary: Death on a Journey...
Review: I do not see Ralph Manheim's new translation of Celine's ''Journey to the End of the Night'' (New Directions) as an improvement over John H.P. Marks's fine 1934 version, I see it as more of a refinement of the times, read both of them if you can. It is good to see Celine being brought back to the public's attention. For all his paranoia and the questions raised by the anti-Semitic pamphlets he wrote at the time of World War II, Celine remains one of the great European novelists of the century, the only logical successor, one might say, to Dostoyevsky. This is a powerful book not for the weak at heart, it is damaging to all your senses and engulfs you in a wonderful passion for true, great literature. In 1932, with ''Journey to the End of the Night,'' Celine snatched French fiction from the manicured hands of Gide and Proust and gave it an elementary gusto, a savage bite it had hardly known since Rabelais. Four years later, with ''Death on the Installment Plan,'' he had already snarled and elbowed his way into the pantheon. ''Journey'' is a picaresque novel whose protagonist fights in World War I, works in Africa, travels to the United States and returns to Paris to become a doctor. An impoverished doctor in a Paris slum like his antihero Ferdinand, Celine clearly announced his position when he wrote this fantastic book, he was "against all". While Cervantes, the other great picaresque novelist, mourned the death of chivalry, Celine's subject was the death of civility. As a slum doctor, he had heard every kind of cry of pain, anger and dispair; you can find them all in his novels, mixed with his own archetypally French humor and transmogrified by a style of exalted disgust. Insisting on spoken rhythms, Celine said that he wanted to have his language ''throb more than reason", he called his style of writing the "music in his head". There's a passage in Nietzsche's ''Beyond Good and Evil'' that could be the best summary of Celine's qualities. He writes that ''it might be possible for a highly developed man, supposing him to degenerate and go to ruin, to acquire qualities thereby alone, for the sake of which he would have to be honored as a saint in the lower world in which he had sunk.'' And we can see Celine as the saint of all things forbidden and dark...
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