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L'Écume des jours

Boris Vian

3.99 · Rating details · 26,348 ratings · 1,131 reviews

Chick, Alise, Chloé et Colin passent leur temps à dire des choses rigolotes, à écouter Duke Ellington et à patiner. Dans ce monde où les pianos sont des mélangeurs à cocktails, la réalité semble ne pas avoir de prise. On se marie à l'église comme on va à la fête foraine et on ignore le travail, qui se réduit à une usine monstrueuse faisant tache sur le paysage.

Pied de nez

...more

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Paperback, 351 pages

Published February 26th 1997 by Le Livre de Poche (first published March 11th 1947)

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Aug 18, 2013 Warwick rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: fiction, paris

Wow, this book destroyed me. Beautiful, oneiric, sexy, deadpan, linguistically inventive – and then in the end remorselessly tragic.

You know what reading this book is like? It's like you're sitting there having fun, the sun's shining – and who do you see bouncing towards you but the most adorable, cute little character you can imagine. The Andrex puppy, say—

Aw, look! It's the Andrex puppy! C'mere, little fella! And he bounds over to you, his little tail wagging away, birds tweeting in the backgr ...more

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Nov 20, 2008 Manny rated it it was amazing

Shelves: life-is-lewis-carroll, french, pooh-dante, strongly-recommended, too-sexy-for-maiden-aunts

I only discovered this recipe a couple of years ago, but it has already become one of my favorites. It's hard to believe that the different ingredients go together! In fact, they complement each other perfectly.

French manga with fatal love stories and roasted Sartre

1 medium manga
2 fatal love stories
whole early Sartre, including author
Lewis Carroll-style wordplay
some P.G. Wodehouse
ridicule
panache
brio

Trim the manga, retaining a good part of the extreme violence, sex and nudity, and transpose into ...more

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Jun 13, 2013 Manny rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Recommends it for: Everyone

Shelves: french, strongly-recommended, too-sexy-for-maiden-aunts, science-fiction, older-men-younger-women, translation-is-impossible, well-i-think-its-funny

After watching the new movie last week, I had to reread the book.

Well, the text version is better, but the movie is reasonably faithful to it and does sometimes manage to supply a charming or witty illustration. For example:

Le pianocktail

- À chaque note, dit Colin, je fais correspondre un alcool, une liqueur ou un aromate. La pédale forte correspond à l'œuf battu et la pédale faible à la glace. Pour l'eau de Seltz, il faut un trille dans le registre aigu. Les quantités sont en raison directe de

...more

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Aug 05, 2016 Algernon (Darth Anyan) rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: 2016

[9/10]

Only two things really matter - there's love, every kind of love, with every kind of pretty girl; and there's the music of Duke Ellington, or traditional jazz. Everything else can go, because all the rest is ugly - and the few pages which follow as an illustration of this draw their entire strength from the fact that the story is completely true since I made it up from beginning to end.

Here's the promise and the warning that Boris Vian gives us in the introduction to his 1947 novel. The ...more

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May 20, 2018 Fede rated it it was amazing

Shelves: french-belgian, fiction

Oh, absolute Joy.

Oh absolute, annihilating, cathartic Beauty of the Word.

It's the third time I surrender to its magic and yet the ineffable, all-pervading delight hasn't vanished... so I'd better write something coherent before letting the secret pleasures of the Stendhal syndrome overwhelm me.

It starts like "La Boum"... and ends like "Love Story".
It's a poem by Prévert... illustrated by Salvador Dalí.
It's a white feather caressing your skin... and leaving a bleeding sore that will never heal Oh, absolute Joy.

Oh absolute, annihilating, cathartic Beauty of the Word.

It's the third time I surrender to its magic and yet the ineffable, all-pervading delight hasn't vanished... so I'd better write something coherent before letting the secret pleasures of the Stendhal syndrome overwhelm me.

It starts like "La Boum"... and ends like "Love Story".
It's a poem by Prévert... illustrated by Salvador Dalí.
It's a white feather caressing your skin... and leaving a bleeding sore that will never heal.
Only free association gives me the means to describe this amazing kaleidoscope of genres. Vian's writing style is an explosion of colours, sounds, tactile feelings - sort of Neo-baroque literature displaying all his eclectic talent and playful genius. "L'Écume des Jours" (literally 'Foam of the Days', translated as "Foam of the Daze" in the English edition) is pure Baroque indeed, a work in which the simplicity of the tale is shrouded by the extreme complexity and ornamentation, like a tiny flower hidden in a Fabergé egg encrusted with diamonds.

In a semi-dystopian, vaguely disquieting Paris (Dalí's imagery, Roussel's surreal machines, Huxley's social engineering, a latent violence reminding of Orwell...) Colin, Isis, Chick and his girlfriend Alise spend their time listening to jazz records, skating and enjoying their friendship and youth. The adult world is little more than a distant blur, so indistinct and remote that it just disappears beyond the horizon of their leightheartedness. Their passion for American jazz and - in Chick's case - the existentialist writer Jean-Sol Partre (a hilarious caricature of Jean-Paul Sartre) is a reflection of the author's own interests: an all-consuming love for Duke Ellington's music and a great knowledge of contemporary literature.
One day Colin meets Chloé, a name he can't help but adore since it is also the title of his favourite Ellington tune; the delicate romance soon leads to marriage and adult life can finally begin.
Delicate, playful, a charming fantasy in pink and blue; thus the writer lures the reader deeper and deeper inside before springing his trap. And we realise that the succulent, juicy fruit we've been eating so far is poisonous.

Death grows as a water lily in Chloé's chest - possibly the most beautiful metaphor for cancer in the history of literature.
Her illness affects the whole world around the young couple, taking the visible shape of their shrinking, decaying flat reminding of the Expressionist film technique (intimate feelings are reflected by the mutability of the outside world: I'm thinking of Murnau or Lang).
Adult life takes the protagonists' youth away like a deadly undertow, leaving layer upon layer of disenchantment: Chick's obsession for Partre (another subtle metaphor? Is Vian more or less unconsciously describing drug addiction?), Colin's desperate attempt to work (Vian's tragicomic vignettes are unforgettable), Alise devastating sense of impotence... Chloé's illness seem to drag everybody down with her. In a few pages, Vian has turned his starry-eyed teenagers into tragical heroes.
This book's painful beauty strikes like a revelation. The reader caught in its coils is lost in a labyrinth of musical, literary, artistic references revolving around the simple core of the tale. Then tragedy starts to leak through the flowery surface of this dreamscape, and a sense of claustrophobia works its way through our heart.

Vian was only 26 when he wrote this short, wonderful book - and yet he already possessed the technique and sensitivity of an old Master. This 'bouquin' is the ultimate accomplishment of the1920s literary Surrealism, a bewildering preview of the 1960s Nouvelle Vague, a perfect specimen of French Po-mo... not to mention Vian's incomparable writing style. His language is made of neologisms, puns, anagrams, semantic mélanges. A gun is an 'equalizer', a lynx fur becomes a 'larynx' fur... but I could go on for hours listing the literary wonders of this novel. Even Jacques Prévert - in my humble opinion the greatest poet of last century, the Modern Poet 'par excellence' - was a devoted admirer and friend of this young talented pioneer.

It's poetic prose and visual literature, if such a thing has ever existed.
It's a melancholic allegory that breaks your heart and makes you smile. A tear rolls down you cheek as you close your eyes and start humming a jazz tune. Duke Ellington's "Chloe", ça va sans dire. ...more

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Oct 12, 2007 Tosh rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: borisvian

There has been three translations of "L'ecme des jours" Brian Harper's translation "Foam of the Daze" (my press TamTam Books), "Mood Indigo" (American trans.) and this British edition translated by Stanley Chapman "Froth on the Daydream." Translations are a fascinating subject matter, because basically it is how one looks at a book and how they tell the tale in a lanugage that is suibtable for that book or culture.

Since I am the publisher, I of course nod towards Brian's translation - one becau ...more

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Mar 28, 2018 P.E. rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: farcical, daily-life, play-on-words, magical-realism

A novel challenging classification, in which verbal fireworks are in the driver's seat!
Nevermind Boris Vian looking like Emmanuel Macron, they are not made from the same dough :)

Musicscape :
Brutal Swing - Igorrr

------------

Roman plutôt inclassable, dans lequel la fantaisie verbale tient le haut du pavé !

Lu sur l'invite de mon père.

Fonds Musical :
Brutal Swing - Igorrr

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Apr 14, 2015 Mariel rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Recommends it for: two mustaches mingled together

Recommended to Mariel by: why did you have her die?

He got passed her and started crying. She was at least fifty-nine years old. He sat down on the curb and cried some more. It relieved him greatly and his tears froze with little crackling sounds and broke on the smooth granite sidewalk.

The garden of children must make their eviction charges like a game of musical chairs. Skies are clown shoes thundering the last laugh. Colin reminded me of my usual answer if I like children or not. “[Searches for an example, every time] Uh, it depends on the kid He got passed her and started crying. She was at least fifty-nine years old. He sat down on the curb and cried some more. It relieved him greatly and his tears froze with little crackling sounds and broke on the smooth granite sidewalk.

The garden of children must make their eviction charges like a game of musical chairs. Skies are clown shoes thundering the last laugh. Colin reminded me of my usual answer if I like children or not. “[Searches for an example, every time] Uh, it depends on the kid, like anyone.” He’s not a kid but I never felt like he was anything else. Halos of luck blind what they are made of. Maybe not quite because Colin and his back-up dancers don’t give me that bittersweet wistfulness an impulsive baby would. What’s residual is that I don’t begrudge them ignorance of the difference between sun and no rise. Michel Gondry made a film version “Mood Indigo”. I switched off in the direction of the cloud mobile lover’s trip. Do you ever feel like things are more real when you can drag them off to drown ‘em, see which fishies make it to the next world. (Sometimes it feels like the things I don’t want to do that with are the blurred days holding me back.) It felt like I was doing this rescuing translation in my mental visual. Vian’s prose is fantastic for this. Suggestions in literal like an exaggerated serious expression on an innocent face. Nick’s taken for granted does a leap-frog. Squishy toes, my some are unluckier than others wading. A smile is losing, it’s colder like you saw a picture of the cold. In the film I was livid when Colin must go to the party so his buddy Chick will not get the girlfriend first. Some friend he is! Film is watching someone being waited on, feet and hands kissed like asses. When did Colin become their leader? Is it the blonde hair, the money. It must be the money, he was first. When Colin gets in love, when Chloe’s his wife. Burning happiness in bed like a fed cat. Chick and Alise aren’t the Someone is telling you about that wonderful dream they had but they are asleep. They start falling before Colin does but maybe they are not necessary for him after all. Nick falls down with him too, he’s catching up with the aged. His niece follows her lover Chick down the hungry pockets of philosopher Partre. Let me reach for my belief in my coat. They'll be there for the doomsday, doublets for today. Colin is losing his money behind Chick. A flower in Chloe’s lung conquers her life. Maybe it was retribution for every bloom that lost its life so a lover could believe in theirs. She goes and Colin goes with her. I knew that you couldn't be a kid again.
...more

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Nov 25, 2018 Tomas Ramanauskas rated it it was amazing

Shelves: gold

I hope you’ll be luckier: my reading of Vian’s modern classic was contaminated with the prior viewing of an infantile French movie by Michel Gondry, called ‘Moon Indingo’. My vague memory has achingly reproduced the characters and some random settings from the film, sneaking them into the book, stealing from my possibilities to flex the imagination muscle.

Despite all this irritation, I have breezed through this book constantly feeling enormous sense of adoration. Vian’s word play, tongue in che ...more

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Dec 30, 2016 Chris_P rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: fantasy, classics-and-modern-classics

L' Écume Des Jours, Foam of the Daze, Mood Indigo, Ο Αφρός των Ημερών

If what I like to call the romantic side of me was to write a book, it wouldn't be that exactly, but something very close to it.

Boris Vian builds an enchanting world of pink clouds and cotton candy made of rays of sunshine, just to tear it apart with a dashing blow. He plants little blue flowers in your mind, just to unleash a herd of omnivorous sheep that will voraciously feed on them along with all that's beautiful and sweet ...more

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Sep 26, 2008 Lavinia rated it liked it

Shelves: fiction, 2008

One might like this book for many reasons: because it's a love story, because it's unconventional, quite bohemian [amelie poulain-like] and maybe even because it's surrealistic and s.f. i called this book a collective bildungsroman, because i have the feeling all characters undergo major changes during the book.

***
o carte care place in primul rind pentru ca e o poveste de dragoste, in al doilea rind pentru ca e neconventionala si nu in ultimul rind pentru ca e de o boemie specifica lui amelie po ...more

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Nov 19, 2017 Jacob Appel rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

What a brilliant, clever novel -- but not for the faint of imagination.

Vian's short novel teems with world play, spoonerisms, puns, backwards logic and verbal chaos, but at the same time manages to create an authentic and emotionally convincing world. The surreal magic of his story is the surreal magic of young love, captured perfectly through Colin's efforts to buy enough flowers to cure his beloved Chloe of the "waterlily on her lung." The novel is unsparing in its satire, including masterful ...more

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Jun 15, 2007 Tosh rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Recommends it for: those who dare to dream

Shelves: books-bought

Part Two:

Out of curiosity and pleasure (of course) I read the two English language translations of Boris Vian's "L´ecume des jours that is now out on the market. "Mood Indigo" was translated in 1967 by Stanley Chapman, and my edition (TamTam Books) was translated about ten years ago. The Brian Harper translation is called "Foam of the Daze." The original Chapman edition was called "Froth on a Daydream." Both translated titles are good, and tricky, due to the poetic title that is "L'´ecume des jo Part Two:

Out of curiosity and pleasure (of course) I read the two English language translations of Boris Vian's "L´ecume des jours that is now out on the market. "Mood Indigo" was translated in 1967 by Stanley Chapman, and my edition (TamTam Books) was translated about ten years ago. The Brian Harper translation is called "Foam of the Daze." The original Chapman edition was called "Froth on a Daydream." Both translated titles are good, and tricky, due to the poetic title that is "L'´ecume des jours." The edition published by FSG is called "Mood Indigo" to tie in with film by Michel Gondry, which for some odd reason they're naming it after the original American translation that came out in the 60s as well and published by the great Grove Press. The title "Mood Indigo" is puzzling, because one, the song "Mood Indigo" is not mentioned at all in the book nor film as far I can remember. Although the song is co-written by the great Duke Ellington, who for sure has an important presence in the Vian book. There are numerous mentions of the song by Ellington called "Chloe, which is an incredible piece of music, but also one of the main characters in the novel is named after the song.
Besides that point, both translations of the Vian novel reads very well. The reasons why I didn't use Chapman's translation was that I felt that it needed a new and fresh translation, and Brian Harper, an American who lives in Paris, kept all the ingredients that makes the book great. Chapman is a tad playful with his translation, which is OK, but it really bugs me when he describes the main character Colin as a "fair-headed Jean Bellpull Rondeau in a film by Jacques Goon Luddard." In the original French edition of the book, as well as in Harper's (TamTam Books) "Foam of the Daze the character is described as the blond actor who plays the role of Slim in "Hollywood Canteen." The role "Slim" is played by actor Robert Hutton. So that was the visual image that Vian had in mind with respect to Colin. Also keep in mind that Lécume des jours was written and published in 1947. The film made by Jean-Luc Godard (Jacques Goon Luddard) was shot in 1959, and came out in France in 1960. One of the other characters in the book is named Alise, but for whatever reasons Chapman re-titled her name as "Alyssum" in "Mood Indigo (Froth on a Daydream). Alyssum I believe to be a type of flower, so Chapman may have used her name as a pun, with respect to the plants and flowers that are listed in the book. Another example of Chapman playing with a name is the cookbook that Colin's chef/friend uses throughout the book that was written in the 19th century. Jules Gouffé was known as a great chef, and his cookbook from the 19th century is very well-known in France. In "Mood Indigo" the chef's name is "ffroydde," which I don't fully understand if it is a pun. So, Chapman plays with titles and names throughout the book, yet, his narrative style is very good. I just question his choices of names and titles, when they are clearly stated in the original French text by Vian.

Also "Foam of the Daze" is based on the 1994 French edition prepared by Gilbert Rybalka and Michel Rybalka. With endnotes by those gentlemen as well as by its translator Brian Harper. Brian also wrote a beautiful introduction to his translation. Also interesting to note, is that Chapman who is British, for sure has his national language in "Mood Indigo," while "Foam of the Daze" is very much American English. A slight difference, but it's interesting to note that. Vian had an appreciation for British literature (for instance Nicolas is based partly on P.G. Wodehouse's Jeeves) but yet, I feel that American English is the proper language use in Vian's translated works in English - especially with respect to his Vernon Sulllivan novels which takes place in America - which ironically enough, Vian never visited the States. In the nutshell it is a lot of fun to read both translations side-by-side, and its easy to do, due to the fact that the chapters are short and concise. Movie or no movie, it is great that the Stanley Chapman translation is out - and without a doubt "L'écume des jours is an excellent book - wharever it is translated by Chapman or Brian Harper - it's a classic and it reads well in (both translated versions) in English.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Ok, first of all I published this edition of "L'´ecume des jours.:" Also Boris Vian is one of my favorite authors - so much so, that I am throwing everything I have in publishing his works.

Now saying that I think "Foam of the Daze" is truly a remarkable work. It's fantasy but fantasy based on real life around Vian circ. 1947. There's Sartre and a lot of other pals of Vian's. The endnotes at the back of the book pretty much explains the (real) relationships that took place in the novel. But beyond that it's pretty much a science fiction work as well as an absurd text.

The story is about a set of friends who are going through extraordianry changes. Also it deals with 'young people' and how they deal with adult issues like death, finances and work. All three things Vian hates!

The book is sad as well as funny. Romantic yet anti-romantic. And of course etc.

Want to read more about Vian check out my website:

www.tamtambooks.com ...more

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Feb 09, 2015 David rated it it was amazing

Shelves: unexpectedly-terrific, read-in-2015

The ending scene of this extraordinary book is just as surreal as the 300 pages that precede it: the little mouse that has appeared throughout as a kind of murine Greek chorus of one decides to commit suicide by cat. It is a testament to the power of the novel that I, for one, cried at that ending.

I started the book with more than a little scepticism because -- well, surrealism --, but within 30 pages I was totally hooked.

I read it in French; there are, I believe, three translations in English. ...more

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May 25, 2020 Vince Will Iam rated it it was amazing

Shelves: mes-lectures-en-français

Brilliant! One of the most original novels I ever read. With this book Boris Vian demonstrated the power of his sparkling, creative mind. His passion for Duke Ellington and jazz was reflected in his eclectic writing. He experimented with language using puns that make you laugh your head off, coined surreal technological devices and peppered all this with dark humor and satire. It is written in a refined, free-flowing style with dazzling descriptions and metaphors.

The young protagonists live in a ...more

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Aug 14, 2014 Sparkle rated it did not like it · review of another edition

Ughhh. I can't tell if the English translation of this is just awful or the whole concept of the book is awful. I'm not sure why I insisted on finishing this, but I did. It's a quick read about pretentious, rich youths who view the only value of women in their beauty, and filled with flawed metaphors and failed magical realism.

I would not recommend this to anyone, and I'm not sure why it had such good reviews. Waste of time.

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Feb 07, 2019 Onur rated it really liked it

Good reference from Paul Sartre regarding the existentialism. Colin seeks a love at the beginning of story than his love is against to him till end. His friend Chick is a Sartre fan and he has on girlfriend, called Alisa. And also, there are good references of books and events belongs to that period. (This point is most interesting issue of book) Book shows us author's good imaginations even perfect when considered he wrote this book 2 days. It is good book, recommended.

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May 21, 2019 Sidharth Vardhan rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: list-le-monde

More like 3.5 stars. It has a kind of Disney reality in which animals, for example, talk to people and there is that somewhat infantile humor. The book begins in a kind of innocent world of some young people who haven't come across the suffering yet. The characters resist and are afraid of things that are for grown-ups - especially having to earn a living. The girls want to buy pretty things and boys want to be able to buy those things for them. As the suffering in its countless forms raises the ...more

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Oct 25, 2014 Rhys rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: five-star-books

I first read this novel back in 1993. It was the first time I had read anything by Vian and immediately upon finishing it I knew it was the best novel I had ever read. I have often thought about in the two decades since then...

Recently I went to the far west of Ireland and in a little secondhand bookshop I found a copy of the novel in the same edition as the one I had originally borrowed from the library. So I bought it and began re-reading it. I was astonished at how much I had forgotten and ho ...more

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Sep 14, 2017 Magdelanye rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: coming-of-age-initiation, existential-crises, health-and-deterioration, language-thought-reality, alternate-reality, postmodern-fiction, reorganizing-the-world, social-commentary

Quietly, gently, with dignity and respect, Boris Vian leads the astonished reader into an incongruent world, a surrealists dream where time and space have taken on more fluid dimensions. Manifestations, of painting and literature and poetry and stubborn dreams, stalk a Paris where the resistance to the Vichy regime is still going on.

A la Breton, BV shines a brilliant light on the most revered of our illusions: love, politics, and religion, and work, and the collection of things.

The've been tol ...more

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Apr 29, 2008 Adam rated it really liked it

Recommends it for: fans of Master and Margarita

In a nutshell, L'Ecume Des Jours reads like an Edith Wharton novel set in Pepperland (sorry, non-cinephiles for the obscure reference). The book rewires your brain after the first 30 pages; if it doesn't, this book is not for you. Themes/motifs: class struggle, love, flowers, Sartre, mice, death and cocktails. My favorite image from the book is when the protagonist loses his fortune and takes a job at a weapons factory. You see, though, the rifle barrels are grown from seeds that must be warmed ...more

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Aug 11, 2015 Gabrielle rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: french, je-suis-snob, mandatory-reading, used-bookstore-finds, reviewed, favorites, desert-island, own-a-copy, stole-it-from-mom, ouch-my-feels

This is a book I have been re-reading periodically for the past fifteen years. I had my mother’s battered old copy for the longest time, it got misplaced in a move and I had to get a shiny new copy immediately. Boris Vian wrote a beautiful, sexy, tragic love story – and he did it with the most enchanting, surrealist prose one can imagine without ever becoming nauseatingly adorable.

The imaginary Paris the characters live in doesn’t know gravity, clouds talk, sunrays can be plucked like guitar str This is a book I have been re-reading periodically for the past fifteen years. I had my mother’s battered old copy for the longest time, it got misplaced in a move and I had to get a shiny new copy immediately. Boris Vian wrote a beautiful, sexy, tragic love story – and he did it with the most enchanting, surrealist prose one can imagine without ever becoming nauseatingly adorable.

The imaginary Paris the characters live in doesn’t know gravity, clouds talk, sunrays can be plucked like guitar strings, philosophers are superstars and you can fish eel in your kitchen sink. But when people are ill, rooms shrink and windows will not let sunlight in. The characters are candid and a little vain: the world is their oyster and they will gorge themselves on refined food, elegant clothes, Jazz and fresh love. Colin loves Chloé and Chick loves Alise. It would be so easy if there wasn’t money to waste on books, an extravagant wedding or doctors… It would be so easy if these people did not have to work and could simply love each other all day…

(Most romantic quote of all time, in my opinion: "Qu'est-ce que vous faites dans la vie, vous? - J'apprends des choses, dit Colin. Et j'aime Chloé.")

Vian created a world of wonders to show us the incredible beauty of falling in love in sharp contrast with the gritty realities of loss and grief. The freshness and carelessness of youth faced with the unpleasant realities of adult life. The original title translates literally into “The foam (or froth) of days”, and that hints at the superficiality of the story: the beauty on the surface that shines brightly in the sunlight, hiding the murky, scary depths of the ocean. This only makes the read more heartbreaking because we all know the bitter taste of growing up, the fear of the unknown we have to face when we shed our teenage skin and realize the world is not the enchanted place we had in mind.

The prose in stunning and rather complex. Vian uses word plays, metaphors, similes and other tricks of language to create magical images and concepts that are more dream than reality. It takes a bit of getting used to, but as soon as your brain gets used to it, you will get sucked into this bizarre poetry. It can’t be described and really must be experienced to be understood.

This is a lush, erotic and blood-stained little book that I recommend to everyone. But be warned, it can crack your heart like an egg and you will find yourself feeling the sharp sting of that ending for a long time after you close the book. Also, I want a pianocktail.

(I’ve only ever read this book in French, so I cannot recommend a good English translation, sadly. Also, I recently watched the movie adaptation, easily found under the title "Mood Indigo". I liked it, but it was just a little too twee for my taste. I also can't quite believe Romain Duris and Audrey Tautou as Colin and Chloé, mostly because the characters always felt to me like they were barely 20 years old, and those actors are now gently pushing 40. It was still a sweet little film, and fans of the book should like it.) ...more

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Dec 30, 2015 Borum rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Wow. This novel started off as one of those dreamy paintings of Marc Chagall where the people seem to take wings and float up in the rainbow and marzipan-scented air just to land a kiss on the lover's cheek. But then, after the ominous shortcut through the copper mine, this turns into a grotesquely surreal painting reminiscent of Dali. It had its mildly sharp witted stabs at the capitalist society in the beginning but in the end it becomes as inhumane as a butcher's knife slicing everyone into a ...more

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Nov 29, 2007 Fostergrants rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Recommended to Fostergrants by: Tosh Berman

imaginative, fanciful, unusual, lush, entertaining. unforgettable! i dog-eared some pages to go back and read again and i have ruined the book with too many ears.

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Jan 29, 2017 Aravindakshan Narasimhan rated it it was amazing

Imagine you are sitting in a restaurant on a sultry evening where the trees are protesting not to dance to the tune of nature, and birds do not show their face or call out. You have started your eating adventure with much hope, only to be shattered by the poor reception and ergonomical errors on the side of hotel management, weary faces of servers, unhindered cacophony and to top it all, a poor food. All makes it one nightmarish dining experience already accentuated by your boring day at work. S ...more

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Jan 06, 2018 sara rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: school-reads

3.5 - but the rating will probably change in the future, because i have a feeling this book is going to stay with me for a very long time from now on

I don't remember the last time I read such a weird, intriguing and fucked up book. I don't know if I liked it or not, but the fact I went through it in ~3 hours must say something. I found the world super interesting, though I am not one for normally accepting sci-fi settings with no explanations. In the beginning, I was pretty neutral in relation t ...more

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Aug 06, 2013 Chris rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

This novel starts out innocently with light-hearted love to the tune of Duke Ellington. Then the blood starts to flow; people are crushed, mice commit suicide, houses collapse in mourning and decay, and the surrealism turns from romantic whimsy to absurd tragedy. References to Jazz music set the tone, which is the most absorbing aspect of the novel for me. Everything is about ambiance: there's no Bildungsroman character development, because the characters are just setting, just mood. Their metam ...more

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Jun 05, 2017 Andrew added it

Shelves: french-language-fiction

Hard to know where I stand on this bit of postwar exuberance. It is Frenchy as fuck, with all the accordion-toned whimsy of Jean-Pierre Jeunet in his jeunesse. I enjoyed it, and I enjoyed every weird image that Vian conjured up, and his whole catalog of impossible-to-translate Spoonerisms. But there was something about it that didn't cohere. I liked every paragraph, but it did feel at times like a more avant-garde version of an episode of Adventure Time.

Sidenote: At the end, Boris Vian mentions ...more

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Apr 24, 2013 Marc rated it it was ok

Shelves: french-literature, absurdism

Absurdist story of the great love between Colin and Chloé. Starting initially as story about very rich people, but everything around them degenerates, together with the water lily that grows in the lung of Chloé. It ends in a massacre. In other words: there's a very wry undertone, but occasionally funny, original finds and pointed dialogues. but not convincing at all.

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Jan 07, 2015 Laurence R. rated it liked it

Shelves: school

Not sure about my rating yet... It's such a weird book that it needs to be deeply analysed to be judged.

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Goodreads Librari...: Japanese descriptions needed	5	56	Jan 06, 2014 07:46AM
La Stamberga dei ...: La schiuma dei giorni di Boris Vian	1	9	Nov 09, 2013 01:42PM

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About Boris Vian

Boris Vian

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Boris Vian was a French polymath: writer, poet, musician, singer, translator, critic, actor, inventor and engineer. He is best remembered for novels such as L’Écume des jours and L'Arrache-cœur (translated into English as Froth on the Daydream and Heartsnatcher, respectively). He is also known for highly controversial "criminal" fiction released under the pseudonym Vernon Sullivan and some of his ...more