''À vau-l'eau'' (English: ''With the Flow'' or ''Downstream'' or ''Drifting'') is a

novella A novella is a narrative prose fiction whose length is shorter than most novels, but longer than most novelettes and short stories. The English word ''novella'' derives from the Italian meaning a short story related to true (or apparently so) ...

by the French writer

Joris-Karl Huysmans Charles-Marie-Georges Huysmans (, ; 5 February 1848 – 12 May 1907) was a French novelist and art critic who published his works as Joris-Karl Huysmans (, variably abbreviated as J. K. or J.-K.). He is most famous for the novel (1884, pub ...

, first published by Henry Kistmaeckers in

Brussels Brussels, officially the Brussels-Capital Region, (All text and all but one graphic show the English name as Brussels-Capital Region.) is a Communities, regions and language areas of Belgium#Regions, region of Belgium comprising #Municipalit ...

on January 26, 1882.

Plot Summary

The work — which has little in the way of plot — tells the story of Jean Folantin, a downtrodden

Paris Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, largest city of France. With an estimated population of 2,048,472 residents in January 2025 in an area of more than , Paris is the List of ci ...

ian civil service clerk whose quest for even a modicum of happiness or material comfort always ends in failure. The book chronicles Folantin's everyday disappointments, typified by his search for a decent meal (there are numerous descriptions of the disgusting food he has to eat). At the end of the novella, Folantin pessimistically resigns himself to give up hope and "go with the flow":

" realised the futility of changing direction, the sterility of all enthusiasm and all effort. 'You have to let yourself go with the flow;
Schopenhauer Arthur Schopenhauer ( ; ; 22 February 1788 – 21 September 1860) was a German philosopher. He is known for his 1818 work '' The World as Will and Representation'' (expanded in 1844), which characterizes the phenomenal world as the manife ...
is right', he told himself, '"Man's life swings like a pendulum between pain and boredom". So there's no point trying to speed up or slow down the rhythm of its swings; all we can do is fold our arms and try to get to sleep....'" (Brown translation, p. 57; in the Baldick translation, p. 68, "go with the flow" is "drift downstream")

''À vau-l'eau'' is a key work in Huysmans' literary development. It is the last book written in the author's early

Naturalist Natural history is a domain of inquiry involving organisms, including animals, fungi, and plants, in their natural environment, leaning more towards observational than experimental methods of study. A person who studies natural history is cal ...

style, with its unflinching depiction of sordid everyday reality, but several features point the way forward to the radical departure marked by Huysmans' next — and most famous — novel, ''

À rebours (; translated ''Against Nature'' or ''Against the Grain'') is an 1884 novel by the French writer Joris-Karl Huysmans. The narrative centers on a single character: Jean des Esseintes, an eccentric, reclusive, ailing aesthete. The last scion o ...

''. Huysmans later noted the similarities between Monsieur Folantin and Des Esseintes, the aristocratic hero of ''À rebours'':

I pictured to myself a M. Folantin, more cultured, more refined, more wealthy, than the first, and who has discovered in artificiality a specific for the disgust inspired by the worries of life and the American manners of our time. I imagined him winging his way to the land of dreams ... living alone and apart, far from the present-day world, in an atmosphere suggestive of more cordial epochs and less odious surroundings. (Quoted in the introduction to the Brown translation, p. xii)

In her book, ''J.-K. Huysmans'', Ruth Antosh writes:

M. Folatin has been compared to other literary prototypes of alienation such as
Sartre Jean-Paul Charles Aymard Sartre (, ; ; 21 June 1905 – 15 April 1980) was a French philosopher, playwright, novelist, screenwriter, political activist, biographer, and literary critic, considered a leading figure in 20th-century French ph ...
's Roquentin and Camus'
Meursault Meursault () is a Communes of France, commune in the Côte-d'Or Departments of France, department and region of Bourgogne-Franche-Comté in eastern France. Etymology The oldest attested form of the toponym Meursault dates from 1094, as ''Mura ...
, but he differs from them in that he seems to have deep-seated spiritual longings, though he rejects them as illogical, absurd. (pp. 35-36)

Translations

*As ''With the Flow'' by Andrew Brown, with an introduction by

Simon Callow Simon Phillip Hugh Callow (born 15 June 1949) is an English actor. Known as a character actor on stage and screen, he has received numerous accolades including an Olivier Award and Screen Actors Guild Award as well as nominations for two BAFT ...

(Hesperus, 2003) *As ''Downstream'' by

Robert Baldick Robert André Edouard Baldick, FRSL (9 November 1927 – April 1972), was a British scholar of French literature, writer, translator and joint editor of the Penguin Classics series with Betty Radice. He was a Fellow of Pembroke College, Oxford. ...

(reprint edition by

Turtle Point Press Turtle Point Press, founded in 1990, publishes new fiction, literary nonfiction, poetry, memoirs, works in translation, and rediscovered classics. History Jonathan D. Rabinowitz established Turtle Point Press in 1990. During his tenure the press ...

, 2005) *As ''Drifting'' by Brendan King (

Dedalus Books Dedalus Books is an independent publishing company based in Cambridgeshire, England. Publisher Eric Lane has said, "We like the bizarre, the grotesque, the surreal and the clever, preferably in the same book. We call this kind of book, distort ...

, 2017)

Sources

* Huysmans, J.-K. ''Romans'', Volume One (Bouquins, Robert Laffont, 2005) * Baldick, Robert, ''The Life of J.-K. Huysmans'' (Oxford University Press, 1955; with a foreword and additional notes by Brendan King, Dedalus Press, 2006) * Antosh, Ruth, ''J.-K. Huysmans'' (London: Reaktion Books, 2024)

External links

Full French text
{{DEFAULTSORT:Vau-L'eau, A 1882 French novels Novels by Joris-Karl Huysmans French novellas Novels set in Paris