Romans-Fleuves

[Patrick Murtha]

I have this thing for romans-fleuves, book series and sequences, whatever you want to call them. I have a lot in progress. I am not a big one for strict definitions, but in my loose way, I would count any fiction that extends to three volumes or more. Usually there is a chronological or other prescribed reading order, but not always (Faulkner).

Apart from crime fiction, here are series I am embarked on.

Joan Aiken (Wolves Chronicles)
Honoré de Balzac (La Comédie humaine)
L. Frank Baum (Oz)
Arnold Bennett (Clayhanger sequence)
James Blish (Cities in Flight)
James Branch Cabell (Biography of the Life of Manuel)
Cao Xueqin (The Story of the Stone)
James Fenimore Cooper (Leatherstocking)
Mazo de la Roche (Jalna)
Alexandre Dumas (Three Musketeers)
Lawrence Durrell (Alexandria Quartet)
James T. Farrell (Studs Lonigan)
William Faulkner (Yoknapatawpha)
Madeleine L’Engle *
Compton Mackenzie (Sinister Street sequence)
John Moore (Elmbury Trilogy)
Anthony Powell (A Dance to the Music of Time)
Simon Raven (Alms for Oblivion)
Dorothy Richardson (Pilgrimage)
Jules Romains (Men of Good Will)
Upton Sinclair (Lanny Budd)
C.P. Snow (Strangers and Brothers)
T.S. Stribling (Vaiden trilogy)
Anthony Trollope (Barsetshire, Palliser)
Emile Zola (Rougon-Macquart)

* ALL of Madeleine L’Engle’s work is linked by recurring characters, one of the largest such projects since Balzac and Faulkner. There is no over-arching reading order, although there are chronological sub-units.

 

[Bartleby]

I learned about this term through the Jean-Christophe novels, by Romain Rolland, which I haven't read yet...

I believe Roger Martin du Gard's The Thibaults would also fit here.

 

[Patrick Murtha]

Absolutely yes, and both of those are on my horizon. ?

 

[Patrick Murtha]

I suppose a natural question might be, if I read so many books and series “at once”, how do I keep track? How do I keep them from bleeding into one another?

Two answers. One, I do keep character lists and notes religiously, and I recommend this whole-heartedly to one and all.

Two, I have this strange, capacious memory that compartmentalizes everything. Jeopardy!-contestant type (although I never tried out for the show, because I’d be bad on the buzzer).

 

[Ben Jackson]

I have read first volumes of Jean Christophe, Alexandria Quartet, and the Thibaults before, all works wonderfully written. I think one would consider Cairo examples (Palace Walk, which I've read and will consider magnificent in the style of Dickens and Tolstoy, Palace Street and Sugar Street) by Naguib Mahfouz, Algerian Trilogy by Mohammed Dib, Knausgaard's My Struggle, Proust's In Search of Lost Time, Neapolitan Novels of Ferrante, and African Trilogy by Chinua Achebe as examples. Hopefully, I would start Upton Sinclair, Anthony Powell, Dorothy Richardson, C.P.Snow and Cao's works.

I also love making notes too for novels of this nature. Thanks Pat for this thread.

 

[Benny Profane]

Brazilians:

- Érico Veríssimo - "O Tempo e o Vento" [The Time and The Wind], based in Taquara and many cities from Rio Grande do Sul, South of Brazil, almost 2500 pages;
- Octávio de Faria - "A Tragédia Burguesa" [Tragedy of Bourgeois], based in Rio de Janeiro, almost 2700 pages;
- Jorge Amado and his novels based in Pelourinho, a district from Salvador, and in Ilhéus, another city from Bahia.

Czech:

- Alois Jirásek - F L Věk;

German:

- Hans Henny Jahnn - Fluss Ohne Ufer;

Dutch:

Simon Vestdjik - Anton Wachter Cycle

 

[Patrick Murtha]

It is very much too bad that the Vestdijk cycle is not available in English. Sounds right up my alley. The De Faria is new to me altogether.

Mahfouz, Verissimo, Proust, Jahnn, all the other examples cited by both of you, yes! One reason to like this form is that it is infinitely adaptable, and there are examples of it in virtually every global literature.

 

[Patrick Murtha]

I found photos of the Jirasek in a number of different editions. Never translated into English as far as I can tell.

 

[Patrick Murtha]

I also love making notes too for novels of this nature.

I write down the full names, shortened names, nicknames. This is important for Russian novels in particilar, where characters are referred to in a bewildering variety of ways. I also make note of relations (brother of so-and-so, etc) and professions / functions. I even write down characters who are only mentioned (such as deceased ones).

For general notes, I might indicate times, places, events, anything helpful really.

 

[Liam]

Two examples that haven't been mentioned thus far:

Marilynne Robinson: the Gilead novels (four so far)

A. S. Byatt: the Frederica Potter novels (1978-2002)

 

[Benny Profane]

I found photos of the Jirasek in a number of different editions. Never translated into English as far as I can tell.

View attachment 1358

The czech Jean Christophe!

I have an only desire in my whole life: to learn czech to translate, at least, the great czech authors such as Božena Němcová, Jaroslav Vrchlický, Joseph Machar, Alois Jisásek, Jan Neruda, Jiří Wolker, Karel Macha, the Čapek brothers, F. X. Šalda, etc.

 

[Ben Jackson]

I write down the full names, shortened names, nicknames. This is important for Russian novels in particilar, where characters are referred to in a bewildering variety of ways. I also make note of relations (brother of so-and-so, etc) and professions / functions. I even write down characters who are only mentioned (such as deceased ones).

For general notes, I might indicate times, places, events, anything helpful really.

It's not only the Russian epics, my brother (novels like Doctor Zhivago and Tolstoy's works come to mind easily). A novel like Heinrich Boll's Group Portrait of a Lady (not a roman fleuve but a very long book with so many characters all connected to the main character Leila Peiffer), is also an example to make notes for.

 

[Patrick Murtha]

It's not only the Russian epics, my brother (novels like Doctor Zhivago and Tolstoy's works come to mind easily). A novel like Heinrich Boll's Group Portrait of a Lady (not a roman fleuve but a very long book with so many characters all connected to the main character Leila Peiffer), is also an example to make notes for.

I do it for crime novels, too - I need to know who the suspects might be! And crime novels sometimes pack a lot of characters into a short space.

Really, it is a good practice for any novel.

 

[Patrick Murtha]

A few others that I hope to get to soon are:

Ford Madox Ford (Parade’s End)
Henry Williamson (The Flax of Dream and A Chronicle of Ancient Sunlight)
Flora Thompson (Lark Rise to Candleford)
John Galsworthy (Forsyte Saga)
L.H. Myers (The Root and the Flower)
Stephen Hudson (Richard Kurt series)
Charles Angoff (David Polonsky series)
Henry de Montherlant (The Girls)
Paul Goodman (The Empire City)
Georges Duhamel (Salavin and Pasquier Chronicles)
Martin Andersen Nexo (Pelle the Conqueror and Ditte)
Sigrid Undset (Kristin Kavransdatter and The Master of Hestviken)
Henrik Pontoppidan (Lucky Per)
Wladyslaw Reymont (The Peasants)
A.H. Tammsaare (Truth and Justice, although the translation into English of that one has not been completed)
Julien Green (Dixie, ditto)
Jacques Chardonne (The House of Barnery, ditto)

But there are just SO MANY, including very obscure ones like the Angoff (11 volumes, 1951-80, bet you never heard of it!). I am always discovering new ones. I believe there are many that are scarcely known outside their native countries.

 

[Liam]

Gibbon's A Scots Quair (1932-1934),

 

[Patrick Murtha]

Gibbon's A Scots Quair (1932-1934),

Forgot about that one. Excellent addition!

 

[Liam]

Not sure if these have been mentioned yet (other than the omnipresent Proust, LOL):

- Galsworthy: The Forsyte Saga
- Powell: A Dance to the Music of Time
- Williamson: A Chronicle of Ancient Sunlight

 

[Patrick Murtha]

Not sure if these have been mentioned yet (other than the omnipresent Proust, LOL):

- Galsworthy: The Forsyte Saga
- Powell: A Dance to the Music of Time
- Williamson: A Chronicle of Ancient Sunlight

Yes, those have been mentioned. I’m finishing up the second volume in Powell's Dance (loving it). I have the first Forsyte volume on my iPad, but haven’t started it yet.

The controversial Henry Williamson is an interesting case, one of those ruralists who tipped over into fascist and Mosleyite enthusiasm (and wasn’t apologetic about it afterward). He does have some ratings and reviews at Goodreads, and there is a Williamson Society with a nice website. I just spotted a very reasonably priced copy of the first volume of Chronicle, The Dark Lantern, and snapped it up,

I forgot a Canadian example, Hugh Hood’s 12-volume New Age series. Even my most devoted CanLit friend hasn’t read this, which of course makes me eager to. ?

 

[Ben Jackson]

A few others that I hope to get to soon are:

Ford Madox Ford (Parade’s End)
Henry Williamson (The Flax of Dream and A Chronicle of Ancient Sunlight)
Flora Thompson (Lark Rise to Candleford)
John Galsworthy (Forsyte Saga)
L.H. Myers (The Root and the Flower)
Stephen Hudson (Richard Kurt series)
Charles Angoff (David Polonsky series)
Henry de Montherlant (The Girls)
Paul Goodman (The Empire City)
Georges Duhamel (Salavin and Pasquier Chronicles)
Martin Andersen Nexo (Pelle the Conqueror and Ditte)
Sigrid Undset (Kristin Kavransdatter and The Master of Hestviken)
Henrik Pontoppidan (Lucky Per)
Wladyslaw Reymont (The Peasants)
A.H. Tammsaare (Truth and Justice, although the translation into English of that one has not been completed)
Julien Green (Dixie, ditto)
Jacques Chardonne (The House of Barnery, ditto)

But there are just SO MANY, including very obscure ones like the Angoff (11 volumes, 1951-80, bet you never heard of it!). I am always discovering new ones. I believe there are many that are scarcely known outside their native countries.

I have Lucky Per, Pelle the Conqueror (read interesting reviews of these monumental Danish works on Irish Times few months back) Lavransadatter, Parade End, Forsyte Saga and The Peasants on my radar too. I heard that a new English Translation of The Peasants is out around November, so maybe that'll be a good chance. And Forsyte Saga is regarded as one of 20th Century finest works.

Has anyone seen the movie adaptation of Pelle the Conqueror? It has late European great actor Max Von Syndow in it and won Best Foreign Film Oscar in 1987.

Do they have famous examples of 21st Century's Roman-fleuves? I only know of Knausgaard's My Struggle. Most books listed were written before, I think, 1995.

 

[Patrick Murtha]

I had not heard about a new translation of The Peasants, that is interesting news!

I have not seen the film version of Pelle the Conqueror.

You guys are much more up on contemporary fiction than I am; I live in the past, mostly. But I do not get the sense that there are many romans-fleuves in progress in the 21st Century. Probably this is because people’s commitment to reading is so much less?

The impulse is still there though, witness cable dramas such as The Sopranos, Mad Men, Six Feet Under, Breaking Bad.