As we’re in the middle of summer and a lot of us have time to read, I thought it would be great to list all the great french books I know and I’ve read if you want to practice french or read french books!! (or just if you don’t have books to read now) note : the list is faaar from being complete !
POETRY
Apollinaire - Alcools, Calligrammes André Breton & Philippe Soupault - The Magnetic Fields Charles Baudelaire - The Flowers of Evil (Les Fleurs du Mal), Paris Spleen (Le Spleen de Paris) Paul Éluard - Capitale de la Douleur, Les Mains Libres Paul Verlaine - Poèmes Saturniens, Romances Sans Paroles Arthur Rimbaud - Illuminations Victor Hugo - The Contemplations Stéphane Mallarmé - Poésies Comte de Lautréamont - The Lay of Maldoror Louise Labé - Poésies Pierre de Ronsard - Les Odes Marceline Desbordes-Valmore - Elegies et romances Alphonse de Lamartine - The Meditations
NOVELS
Albert Camus - The Stranger, The Plague, The First Man Jean-Paul Sartre - Nausea, The Words Annie Ernaux - The Years, The Possession, Shame, Happening, A Woman’s Story Stendhal - The Red and the Black Victor Hugo - The Hunchback of Notre-Dame, Les Misérables Madame de La Fayette - La Princesse de Clèves Madeleine de Scudéry - Clélie Honoré de Balzac - The Unknown Masterpiece, Old Goriot Gustave Flaubert - Madame Bovary, Sentimental Education George Sand - Story of my Life Alfred de Musset - The Confession of a Child from the Century Laurent Binet - HHhH, The Seventh Function of Language Jean Teulé - The Suicide Shop, Eat Him if You Like, Monsieur Montespan, Charly 9 Voltaire - Zadig, Candide Chrétien de Troyes - Yvain, The Knight of the Lion + Lancelot, The Knight of the Cart Marguerite Duras - The Ravishing of Lol V. Stein Marguerite Yourcenar - Memoirs of Hadrian Antoine de Saint-Exupéry - Night Flight, The Little Prince, The Wisdom of the Sands Jean de la Fontaine - The Fables Émile Zola - The Beast Within Marcel Proust - In Search of Lost Time André Gide - The Counterfeiters, The Immoralist, The Vatican Cellars, The Pastoral Symphony François-René de Chateaubriand - René, Atala, Memoirs from Beyond the Grave Aragon - Aurélien Jean-Jacques Rousseau - Reveries of a Solitary Walker
PLAYS
Albert Camus - Caligula, The Just Assassins Jean-Paul Sartre - No Exit, The Flies, The Chips Are Down Bernard-Marie Koltès - Return to the Desert, The Night Just Before the Forests Jean-Luc Lagarce - It’s Only the End of the World Alfred de Musset - Lorenzaccio Jean Giraudoux - The Trojan War will not take place, Amphytrion 38, Ondine Eugène Ionesco - The Lesson, The Bald Soprano, Exit the King, Rhinoceros Voltaire - Zaïre Pierre de Corneille - La Place Royale, Le Cid, L’Illusion Comique Jean Racine - Bérénice, Phèdre Samuel Beckett - Waiting for Godot
