Bookey

30 Best Journey To The End Of The Night Quotes With Image

1) The harsh realities of war: Journey to the End of the Night explores the brutal nature of war and its devastating effects on individuals. The protagonist, Ferdinand Bardamu, experiences the horrors of World War I and witnesses firsthand the destruction and senselessness of combat. This lesson highlights the futility and cruelty of war, challenging the glorified and heroic narratives often associated with it.

2) The dehumanizing impact of modern society: The novel portrays modern society as an impersonal and soul-crushing machine that devalues individuals and reduces them to mere cogs in the system. Bardamu encounters various dehumanizing institutions and environments such as colonial Africa, factory work, and organized crime. This lesson underscores the existential angst and alienation that can result from living in a society driven by efficiency and profit.

3) The elusive search for purpose and meaning: Throughout his journey, Bardamu grapples with the precarious nature of existence and the question of life's ultimate purpose. He encounters individuals from different walks of life, all searching for their own version of meaning. This lesson explores the existential angst and the human desire to find significance in a seemingly chaotic and indifferent universe.

4) The destructive power of human desires and illusions: The novel delves into the destructive consequences that stem from unchecked desires and illusions. Bardamu encounters characters consumed by their own ambitions, whether it be wealth, power, or sexual gratification. These characters are portrayed as victims of their own desires, highlighting the dangers of pursuing goals without considering the moral implications or the toll it takes on one's humanity.

5) The limits of escape: Journey to the End of the Night explores the theme of escape - the longing to flee from one's circumstances and find refuge elsewhere. Bardamu's journey takes him from Europe to Africa, from the city to the countryside, and even to the depths of the ocean. However, despite his attempts to escape, he ultimately realizes that there is no true sanctuary from the human condition. This lesson warns against the fallacy of escapism and emphasizes the importance of confronting and accepting one's reality.

journey to the end of night quotes

journey to the end of night quotes

Quotes from Journey to the End of the Night

Louis-Ferdinand Céline ·  453 pages

Rating: (25K votes)

“The sadness of the world has different ways of getting to people, but it seems to succeed almost every time.” ― Louis-Ferdinand Céline, quote from Journey to the End of the Night

“An unfamiliar city is a fine thing. That's the time and place when you can suppose that all the people you meet are nice. It's dream time. ” ― Louis-Ferdinand Céline, quote from Journey to the End of the Night

“There's no tyrant like a brain. ” ― Louis-Ferdinand Céline, quote from Journey to the End of the Night

“There is something sad about people going to bed. You can see they don’t give a damn whether they’re getting what they want out of life or not, you can see they don’t ever try to understand what we’re here for. They just don’t care. Americans or not, they sleep no matter what, they’re bloated mollusks, no sensibility, no trouble with their conscience. I’d seen too many troubling things to be easy in my mind. I knew too much and not enough. I’d better go out, I said to myself, I’d better go out again. Maybe I’ll meet Robinson. Naturally that was an idiotic idea, but I dreamed it up as an excuse for going out again, because no matter how I tossed and turned on my narrow bed, I couldn’t snatch the tiniest scrap of sleep. Even masturbation, at times like that, provides neither comfort nor entertainment. Then you're really in despair.” ― Louis-Ferdinand Céline, quote from Journey to the End of the Night

“If you aren't rich you should always look useful.” ― Louis-Ferdinand Céline, quote from Journey to the End of the Night

journey to the end of night quotes

“Why kid ourselves, people have nothing to say to one another, they all talk about their own troubles and nothing else. Each man for himself, the earth for us all. They try to unload their unhappiness on someone else when making love, they do their damnedest, but it doesn't work, they keep it all, and then they start all over again, trying to find a place for it. "Your pretty, Mademoiselle," they say. And life takes hold of them again until the next time, and then they try the same little gimmick. "You're very pretty, Mademoiselle..." And in between they boast that they've succeeded in getting rid of their unhappiness, but everyone knows it's not true and they've simply kept it all to themselves. Since at the little game you get uglier and more repulsive as you grow older, you can't hope to hide your unhappiness, your bankruptcy, any longer. In the end your features are marked with that hideous grimace that takes twenty, thrity years or more to climb form your belly to your face. That's all a man is good for, that and no more, a grimace that he takes a whole lifetime to compose. The grimace a man would need to express his true soul without losing any of it is so heavy and complicated that he doesn't always succeed in completing it.” ― Louis-Ferdinand Céline, quote from Journey to the End of the Night

“That is perhaps what we seek throughout life, that and nothing more, the greatest possible sorrow so as to become fully ourselves before dying.” ― Louis-Ferdinand Céline, quote from Journey to the End of the Night

“Lots of men are like that, their artistic leanings never go beyond a weakness for shapely thighs.” ― Louis-Ferdinand Céline, quote from Journey to the End of the Night

“I crawled back into myself all alone, just delighted to observe that I was even more miserable than before, because I had brought a new kind of distress and something that resembled true feeling into my solitude.” ― Louis-Ferdinand Céline, quote from Journey to the End of the Night

“The plain truth, I may as well admit it, is that I've never been really right in the head.” ― Louis-Ferdinand Céline, quote from Journey to the End of the Night

“When it becomes really impossible to get away and sleep, then the will to live evaporates of its own accord.” ― Louis-Ferdinand Céline, quote from Journey to the End of the Night

“You can lose your way groping among the shadows of the past.” ― Louis-Ferdinand Céline, quote from Journey to the End of the Night

“I warn you that when the princes of this world start loving you it means they are going to grind you up into battle sausage.” ― Louis-Ferdinand Céline, quote from Journey to the End of the Night

“Love is like liquor, the drunker and more impotent you are, the stronger and smarter you think yourself and the surer you are of your rights.” ― Louis-Ferdinand Céline, quote from Journey to the End of the Night

“You can lose your way groping among the shadows of the past. It's frightening how many people and things there are in a man's past that have stopped moving. The living people we've lost in the crypts of time sleep so soundly side by side with the dead that the same darkness envelops them all. As we grow older, we no longer know whom to awaken, the living or the dead.” ― Louis-Ferdinand Céline, quote from Journey to the End of the Night

“There's something sad about people going to bed. You can see they don't give a damn whether they're getting what they want out of life or not, you can see they don't even try to understand what we're here for. They just don't care.” ― Louis-Ferdinand Céline, quote from Journey to the End of the Night

“Philosophizing is simply one way of being afraid, a cowardly pretense that doesn't get you anywhere.” ― Louis-Ferdinand Céline, quote from Journey to the End of the Night

“I hadn't found out yet that mankind consists of two very different races, the rich and the poor. It took me ... and plenty of other people . . . twenty years and the war to learn to stick to my class and ask the price of things before touching them, let alone setting my heart on them.” ― Louis-Ferdinand Céline, quote from Journey to the End of the Night

“When men can hate without risk, their stupidity is easily convinced, the motives supply themselves.” ― Louis-Ferdinand Céline, quote from Journey to the End of the Night

“When you stop to examine the way in which our words are formed and uttered, our sentences are hard-put to it to survive the disaster of their slobbery origins. The mechanical effort of conversation is nastier and more complicated than defecation. That corolla of bloated flesh, the mouth, which screws itself up to whistle, which sucks in breath, contorts itself, discharges all manner of viscous sounds across a fetid barrier of decaying teeth—how revolting! Yet that is what we are adjured to sublimate into an ideal. It's not easy. Since we are nothing but packages of tepid, half-rotted viscera, we shall always have trouble with sentiment. Being in love is nothing, its sticking together that's difficult. Feces on the other hand make no attempt to endure or grow. On this score we are far more unfortunate than shit; our frenzy to persist in ourpresent state—that's the unconscionable torture. Unquestionably we worship nothing more divine than our smell. All our misery comes from wanting at all costs to go on being Tom, Dick, or Harry, year in year out. This body of ours, this disguise put on by common jumping molecules, is in constant revolt against the abominable farce of having to endure. Our molecules, the dears, want to get lost in the universe as fast as they can! It makes them miserable to be nothing but 'us,' the jerks of infinity. We'd burst if we had the courage, day after day we come very close to it. The atomic torture we love so is locked up inside us by our pride.” ― Louis-Ferdinand Céline, quote from Journey to the End of the Night

“A man should be resigned to knowing himself a little better each day if he hasn't got the guts to put an end to his sniveling once and for all.” ― Louis-Ferdinand Céline, quote from Journey to the End of the Night

“When you stay too long in the same place, things and people go to pot on you, they rot and start stinking for your special benefit.” ― Louis-Ferdinand Céline, quote from Journey to the End of the Night

“Poor people never, or hardly ever, ask for an explanation of all they have to put up with. They hate one another, and content themselves with that.” ― Louis-Ferdinand Céline, quote from Journey to the End of the Night

“A God who counts minutes and pennies, a desperate sensual God, who grunts like a pig. A pig with golden wings, who falls and falls, always belly side up, ready for caresses, that’s him, our master. Come, kiss me.” ― Louis-Ferdinand Céline, quote from Journey to the End of the Night

“In the kitchens of love, after all, vice is like the pepper in a good sauce; it brings out the flavor, it’s indispensable.” ― Louis-Ferdinand Céline, quote from Journey to the End of the Night

“We've no use for intellectuals in this outfit. What we need is chimpanzees. Let me give you a word of advice: never say a word to us about being intelligent. We will think for you, my friend. Don't forget it.” ― Louis-Ferdinand Céline, quote from Journey to the End of the Night

“We never change. Neither our socks nor our masters nor our opinions, or we're so slow about it that it's no use. We were born loyal and that's what killed us! Soldiers free of charge, heroes for everyone else, talking monkeys, tortured words, we are the minions of King Misery...It's not a life.” ― Louis-Ferdinand Céline, quote from Journey to the End of the Night

“This instinctive repulsion which tradespeople inspire in men of sensitive feeling is one of the very rare consolations for being so impoverished which are given to those of us who don’t sell anything to anybody.” ― Louis-Ferdinand Céline, quote from Journey to the End of the Night

“Love is the infinite placed within the reach of poodles. I have my dignity!” ― Louis-Ferdinand Céline, quote from Journey to the End of the Night

About the author

journey to the end of night quotes

Louis-Ferdinand Céline Born place: in Courbevoie, France Born date May 27, 1894 See more on GoodReads

Popular quotes

“It is an old truth that men and women sometimes miss what they hate as much as what they love.” ― Guy Gavriel Kay, quote from The Lions of Al-Rassan

“I don't wish to denigrate a sport that is enjoyed by millions, some of them awake and facing the right way, but it is an odd game. It is the only sport that incorporates meal breaks. It is the only sport that shares its name with an insect. It is the only sport in which spectators burn as many calories as players - more if they are moderately restless. It is the only competitive activity of any type, other than perhaps baking, in which you can dress in white from head to toe and be as clean at the end of the day as you were at the beginning.” ― Bill Bryson, quote from In a Sunburned Country

“Okay, this is the wisdom. First, time spent on reconnaissanse is never wasted. Second, almost anything can be improved with the addition of bacon. And finally, there is no problem on Earth that can't be ameliorated by a hot bath and a cup of tea.” ― Jasper Fforde, quote from Shades of Grey

“When our ancestors were attacked at Pearl Harbor, they called it a day that would live in infamy. The day the Partials attacked us with the RM Virus will not live in anything, because there will be none of us left to remember it." -President David R. Cregan, March 21, 2065, in a press conference at the White House. Three hours later he hanged himself.” ― Dan Wells, quote from Partials

“It bewildered Ig, the idea that a person could not be interested in music. It was like not being interested in happiness.” ― Joe Hill, quote from Horns

Interesting books

A Sister's Promise

About BookQuoters

BookQuoters is a community of passionate readers who enjoy sharing the most meaningful, memorable and interesting quotes from great books. As the world communicates more and more via texts, memes and sound bytes, short but profound quotes from books have become more relevant and important. For some of us a quote becomes a mantra, a goal or a philosophy by which we live. For all of us, quotes are a great way to remember a book and to carry with us the author’s best ideas.

We thoughtfully gather quotes from our favorite books, both classic and current, and choose the ones that are most thought-provoking. Each quote represents a book that is interesting, well written and has potential to enhance the reader’s life. We also accept submissions from our visitors and will select the quotes we feel are most appealing to the BookQuoters community.

Founded in 2023, BookQuoters has quickly become a large and vibrant community of people who share an affinity for books. Books are seen by some as a throwback to a previous world; conversely, gleaning the main ideas of a book via a quote or a quick summary is typical of the Information Age but is a habit disdained by some diehard readers. We feel that we have the best of both worlds at BookQuoters; we read books cover-to-cover but offer you some of the highlights. We hope you’ll join us.

“So many books, so little time.” ― Frank Zappa

  • Bookquoters

Louis-Ferdinand Céline - Journey to the End of the Night (1932)

21 sourced quotes, quote of the day, louis-ferdinand céline.

Louis-Ferdinand Céline

Featured Authors

Diana, Princess of Wales

Predictions that didn't happen

If it's on the Internet it must be true

If it's on the Internet it must be true

Remarkable Last Words (or Near-Last Words)

Remarkable Last Words (or Near-Last Words)

Picture quotes.

If you see what is right and fail to act on it, you lack courage.

Philip James Bailey

Life was meant to be lived, and curiosity must be kept alive.

Eleanor Roosevelt

A great change in life is like a cold bath in winter — we all hesitate at the first plunge.

Letitia Elizabeth Landon

Popular topics.

Literary Theory and Criticism

Home › French Literature › Analysis of Louis-Ferdinand Céline’s Journey to the End of the Night

Analysis of Louis-Ferdinand Céline’s Journey to the End of the Night

By NASRULLAH MAMBROL on July 30, 2023

The 1932 publication of the cynical and darkly comic Journey to the End of the Night by Louis-Ferdinand Céline (1894–1961) sent immediate shock waves into a French literary world still reeling from the social and artistic disruptions of World War I. Its audacious literary use of spoken French—a colloquial Parisian slang, itself vulgar, funny, street-smart, and corporeal—together with its running first-person commentaries on the imbecilities of war, colonialism, industrialism, and what Henry Miller would call the “air-conditioned nightmare” of 20th-century life, were embraced in the anti–status quo intellectual atmosphere of 1930s Paris. The novel has since remained a brilliant and insightful, if bitter and often misanthropic, commentary on the modern condition. Its influence has extended beyond the postwar French existentialists to the United States, where it can be felt in writers as diverse as Henry Miller, Kurt Vonnegut, Jack Kerouac, and William Burroughs.

Episodic in structure, picaresque in form, Journey to the End of the Night is told in the first person and covers the experiences of the narrator, Bardamu, from his early 20s until his mid-30s, tracing his adventures across three continents and chronicling his “aimless pilgrimage” toward self-knowledge. It opens as the young medical student, caught up in the martial spirit that engulfed Europe in the weeks preceding the outbreak of war in 1914, enlists in the army. Suddenly, he informs us, “The music stopped. Then I said to myself, as I saw how things were going, ‘It’s not such fun, after all. I doubt it’s worth it.’ And I was going to go back. But it was too late! They’d shut the gate behind us, quietly; the civilians had. We were caught, like rats in a trap.” Bardamu’s journey begins.

journey to the end of night quotes

The horrors of war scenes, drawn from Céline’s own experiences on the front, are justly famous. Bardamu’s early naïve idealism quickly gives way to cynicism; the war is civilization’s death wish. “You can see,” he says of the dead, “that they died for nothing. For nothing at all, the idiots. I swear that’s true; you can see that it is. Only life itself is important.” For Bardamu, the carnage exposes the language of glory, country, and patriotism as a deadly lie. “The poetry of heroism,” he argues, “appeals irresistibly to those who don’t go to war, and even more to those whom the war is making enormously wealthy. It’s always so.” Bardamu himself becomes its victim. Wounded and subject to hallucinations and panic attacks, he survives the war in and out of hospitals, always walking a dangerously fine line between being permanently institutionalized, ordered back to the front, or executed as a coward.

Finally, invalided out of the regular French army, Bardamu next finds himself a minor official in a remote French African trading post, a lone European wracked with fevers and no real duties or purpose. He soon discovers the horrors and insanities of the colonial system are equal to those he endured at the front. “The wielder of the lash,” he finds, “gets very tired of his job in the end, but the white man’s heart is brimful of the hope of power and wealth that doesn’t cost anything.” Yet if the native peoples must be whipped to force compliance in the absurd farce, “the whites carry on on their own; they’ve been well schooled by the state.” Nevertheless, in this unlikely place, Bardamu encounters the selfl ess officer, Alcide, who reenlists in hell to provide an education for his crippled niece, giving her “the gift of years of torment, the annihilation of his poor life in this torrid monotony, without making conditions and without bargaining, uncalculating.”

After escaping the European wars and African jungles, America beckons to Bardamu as the 20th-century’s Promised Land. It is a false promise, a desire-driven trance induced by that “two hour whore,” the movies. A different reality confronts Bardamu, first in New York and later in Detroit, where he works on the Ford assembly line. Urban America is “an insipid carnival of vertiginous buildings,” a “cancer of promiscuous and pestilential advertising,” and its factories and workplaces merely dehumanizing machines, better designed to employ well-trained chimpanzees than thinking, feeling humans. Always on the move, always in a hurry, America fascinates Bardamu. “What is it that frightens all these bloody people so?” he wonders. “It’s probably somewhere at the farther end of the night. That’s why they don’t go into the depths of the night themselves.”

The last sections of the novel find that Bardamu has finished his studies and is practicing medicine as best he can in the poor, working-class suburbs of Paris. Twenty years older, and more resigned than indignant, he is no longer running from either life or himself. Yet, in the face of the medical establishment’s complete indifference, he cannot prevent the innocent young Bebert from dying of typhoid or save a young woman from slowly bleeding to death of an abortion when the family, to avoid a scandal, refuses to send her to a hospital. There is “no exit” from life but death, an exit which, as Germaine Bree notes in The French Novel from Gide to Camus, is held in check by Bardamu’s “unreasoning animal instinct for physical survival.”

Throughout the novel, Bardamu’s adventures parallel and often intersect with those of his alter ego or double, the shadowy and mysterious Robinson, whose experiences more than once prefigure Bardamu’s own. When the two first meet on the battlefield, Robinson has already made his plans to drop out of the war. When Bardamu reaches his remote African post, he discovers he is replacing Robinson, who had just absconded with the company funds. In Detroit he again encounters Robinson. Even in the Paris suburbs, he cannot escape Robinson, whose active nihilism mirrors Bardamu’s passivity. Now a petty criminal, Robinson has agreed to murder an old woman for a thousand francs. When the plot falls through and he is injured in the failed attempt, Bardamu oversees his recovery. The novel ends with Robinson’s death. The murder accomplished, Robinson is shot by a jilted girlfriend, leaving Bardamu both free and alone. “Try as I might to lose my way, so as not to find myself face to face with my own life, I kept coming up against it everywhere. My aimless pilgrimage was over. Let others carry on the game! The world had closed in. We had come to the end.”

BIBLIOGRAPHY Ostrovsky, Erica. Céline and His Vision. New York: New York University Press, 1967. Thomas, Merlin. Louis Ferdinand Céline. New York: New Directions, 1980. Vitoux, Frederic. Céline: A Biography. New York: Paragon House, 1992.

Share this:

Categories: French Literature , Literature , Novel Analysis

Tags: Analysis of Louis-Ferdinand Céline's Journey to the End of the Night , Appreciation of Louis-Ferdinand Céline's Journey to the End of the Night , Criticism of Louis-Ferdinand Céline's Journey to the End of the Night , Essays of Louis-Ferdinand Céline's Journey to the End of the Night , Guide of Louis-Ferdinand Céline's Journey to the End of the Night , Journey to the End of the Night , Louis-Ferdinand Céline's Journey to the End of the Night , Notes of Louis-Ferdinand Céline's Journey to the End of the Night , Novel of Louis-Ferdinand Céline's Journey to the End of the Night , Plot of Louis-Ferdinand Céline's Journey to the End of the Night , Story of Louis-Ferdinand Céline's Journey to the End of the Night , Structure of Louis-Ferdinand Céline's Journey to the End of the Night , Summary of Louis-Ferdinand Céline's Journey to the End of the Night , Themes of Louis-Ferdinand Céline's Journey to the End of the Night

Related Articles

journey to the end of night quotes

You must be logged in to post a comment.

journey to the end of night quotes

  • study guides
  • lesson plans
  • homework help

Journey to the End of the Night Quotes

Journey to the End of the Night by Louis-Ferdinand Céline

(read more)

View Journey to the End of the Night Style

FOLLOW BOOKRAGS:

Follow BookRags on Facebook

Louis-Ferdinand Céline

journey to the end of night quotes

Louis-Ferdinand Céline ( May 27 , 1894 – July 1 , 1961 ) was a French author .

  • 1.1 Voyage au bout de la nuit ( Journey to the End of the Night , 1932)
  • 1.2 Mea culpa; suivi de la vie et l'oeuvre de Semmelweis (1937)
  • 1.3 L'Ecole des cadavres ( The School for Corpses , 1938)
  • 1.4 Les Beaux Draps ( A Fine Mess , 1941)
  • 2 About Louis-Ferdinand Céline
  • 3 References

Quotes [ edit ]

  • (March 30, 1947) [1]
  • ( Letters to Milton Hindus ) [1]
  • Des pays où personne ne va jamais . Interview of February 1960 with Jean Guenot und Jacques d'Arribehaude.
  • Reported in Céline à Meudon  : transcriptions des entretiens avec Jacques d'Arribehaude et Jean Guenot. Éditions Jean Guenot, 1995 ISBN 2-85405-058-4
  • L'École des cadavres (School for Corpses), Denoël 1942, p. 6
  • ( « L'argot est né de la haine, il n'existe plus» Arts , 6. February 1957. in À l’agité du bocal et autres textes, ( op. cit. ) p. 55.
  • in Albert Paraz, Le Gala des Vaches , Éditions de l’Élan, Paris, 1948 ; À l'agité du bocal , et autres textes de L.-F. Céline, l'Herne / Carnets de l'Herne ISBN 9782851976567 , 2006, 85 p. ; To the Fidgeting Lunatic (Céline on Sartre ), translation by Constantin Rigas.

Voyage au bout de la nuit ( Journey to the End of the Night , 1932) [ edit ]

  • Everything interesting takes place in the dark ; there is no doubt about it. We know nothing of the true story of the men. ― [6]
  • Almost every desire a poor man has is a punishable offence.[16]
  • We are, by nature, so futile that distraction alone can prevent us from dying altogether.[17]
  • Love is infinity - come down to poodles' level.[1]
  • It's harder to lose the wish to love than the wish to live.[7]
  • Living, just by itself - what a dirge that is! Life is a classroom and boredom's the usher, there all the time to spy on you; whatever happens, you've got to look as if you were awfully busy all the time doing something that's terribly exciting - or he'll come along and nibble your brain.[32]
  • And the music came back with the carnival, the music you've heard as far back as you can remember, ever since you were little, that's always playing somewhere, in some corner of the city, in little country towns, wherever poor people go and sit at the end of the week to figure out what's become of them, sometimes here, sometimes there, from season to season, it tinkles and grinds out the tunes that rich people danced to the year before. It's the mechanical music that floats down from the wooden horses, from the cars that aren't cars anymore, from the railways that aren't at all scenic, from the platform under the wrestler who hasn't any muscles and doesn't come from Marseille, from the beardless lady, the magician who's a butter-fingered jerk, the organ that's not made of gold, the shooting gallery with the empty eggs. It's the carnival made to delude the weekend crowd. We go in and drink the beer with no head on it. But under the cardboard trees the stink of the waiter's breath is real. And the change he gives you has several peculiar coins in it, so peculiar that you go on examining them for weeks and weeks and finally, with considerable difficulty, palm them off on some beggar. What do you expect at the carnival? Gotta have what fun you can between hunger and jail, and take things as they come. No sense complaining, we're sitting down aren't we? Which ain't to be sneezed at. I saw the same old Gallery of the Nations, the one Lola caught sight of years and years ago on that avenue in the park of Saint-Cloud. You always see things again at carnivals, they revive the joy of past carnivals. Over the years the crowds must have come back time and again to stroll on the main avenue of the park of Saint-Cloud...taking it easy. The war had been over long ago. And say I wonder if that shooting gallery still belonged to the same owner? Had he come back alive from the war? I take an interest in everything. Those are the same targets, but in addition, they're shooting at airplanes now. Novelty. Progress. Fashion. The wedding was still there, the soldier too, and the town hall with its flag. Plus a few more things to shoot at than before.[27]
  • The one who talks about the future is a rascal. The present is the only thing that matters. To invoke one’s posterity is to make a speech to maggots. [4]
  • A woman who spends her time worrying about pregnancy is a virtual cripple; she'll never go very far.― [7]
  • I warn you that when the princes of this world start loving you it means they are going to grind you up into battle sausage. ― [6]
  • If you aren't rich you should always look useful.
  • In the kitchens of love , after all, vice is like the pepper in a good sauce; it brings out the flavour, it's indispensable." ― [6]
  • - (Lola): Only mad men and cowards refuse to go to the war , when their homeland is in danger! - (Bardamu): So, hurrah for the mad men and the cowards! ― [6]
  • "The rich don't have to kill to eat." – [30]
  • The rich are inebriate in another way and cannot contrive to grasp these frenzied longings for security. To be rich is another form of intoxication: it spells forgetfulness. In fact, that is what one wants riches for: to forget.
  • I cannot refrain from doubting that there exist other genuine realizations of our deepest character than war and illness , those two infinities of nightmare.[39]
  • The natives, by and large, had to be driven to work with clubs, they preserved that much dignity, whereas the whites, perfected by public education , worked of their own free will.[12]
  • Why struggle, waiting is good enough, since thievery is bound to end up in the street. Basically, only the street counts. Why deny it? It's waiting for us. One of these days we'll have to make up our minds and go down in to the street, not one or two or three of us, but all. We stand on the brink, we simper and fuss, but never mind, the time will come.

Mea culpa; suivi de la vie et l'oeuvre de Semmelweis (1937) [ edit ]

  • Politics has putrified mankind more profoundly in the last three centuries than in the whole of pre-history. We were more united in the middle ages than we are today; then a common spirit took form.[16]
  • Since the end of the period of belief, leaders exalt every defect, every kind of sadism, and gain all the more through their vices: vanity, ambition, war, death in a word.[16]
  • [Industrialized man, drunk on alcohol and gasoline, becomes a confusion of sheep, bull and hyena.] Charming. The least obstructed little asshole looks on himself in the mirror as Jupiter.[18]
  • {Music symbolizes the loss of faith, of common belief.] The small, intimate church is closed, the organs are dead, it is sadder than before. Only those whom fate designs for the eternal mass of infinite love remain. They compose only a very small chapel of clarity in space and time.[45]
  • In this society which we are induced to frequent, composed above all of politicians and artists, one cannot realize one's true worth.[99]

L'Ecole des cadavres ( The School for Corpses , 1938) [ edit ]

  • It is in the United States that one may better see, if one has the taste for it, the vast Jewish panic, the mad anguish that strangles, the camouflaged arrogance, at the slightest evocation of a possibility of their regulation for the general world-wide good.[50]
  • The three radios, the six cars, the four refrigerators, the seven telephones in each of the 300,000 Jewish households, and the super-television![51]
  • ...personally I find Hitler, Franco, Mussolini fabulously debonaire, admirably magnanimous, infinitely more sympathetic...than 250 Nobel Prize winners.
  • The judeo-Americans are notorious idiots, bellylanding in foolishness: look at Roosevelt, Otto Khan, Morgenthau, Filene, Barush, Rosenthal...Observe these cunts. [75]
  • [The fascist states want no war] Why? Because the fascist states realize before our very eyes, among Aryans, without gold, without Jews, without Freemasons, the famous socialist program, of which the communists have had their mugs full and have never brought off. [100]
  • Your system of producing wealth, factories, mines, cooperatives will fall apart, like everything else, under the attacks of the people, in the delirious, popular boulimia. [101]
  • Spiritually we are at ground zero, sunk, bored to perdition. All our arts prove it. Since the renaissance, so mechanized, we repeat with almost futile variants the same hackneyed sentimentalities (we call them eternal values!) Love! Re-love No Love! More Love! [102]
  • ...the material bungling, the ladder-climbing and the shit, you are going marvelously to be served! Shitty! You yourselves are promised to the revolutionary puppies! Bulging eyed, aberrant, pontificating, cock-up cancers, you committed at the outset the capital, inexpiable mistake: you have bet according to your guts, you have adulated, exalted, fawned on and glorified your tripes.[105]
  • You pin-heads, you have not understood in communism its admirable, instantaneous manner of appeasing all your ruined tax-payer grudges ferociously, in the name of a new purity, a non-existent proletarian virtue, you deceived jackals. Your intimate personal plan won't wash. I am well acquainted with you. [128]
  • Above all communism is a poetic vocation. Without poetry, without a burning, purifying altruistic fervor, communism is only a farce, the receptacle of all anger, of all plebian resentment, the decadent playhouse of sharks, of all the tragic pimps, of all Jews, performing their Talmudic imposture. [130]
  • The populace is a true museum of all the stupidities of the ages: it swallows everything, it admires everything, it preserves everything, it defends everything, it understands nothing. [145]
  • [The press from right to left, is corrupt. It will say anything if the bribe is large enough]...gloss over events according to the color of the subsidy, undress, attack, traduce, rant, all according to the sum in the envelope. [177]
  • In democratic politics it is money that commands. And the money is Jewish. [180]
  • Our French Republic is no more than a great gullet swallowing the negroizing of the French at the command of the Jews. Our governors are a clique of sadistic yids and yellow-bellied masons sworn to swallow us up, to bastardize us further, to boil us down by all the grotesque, primitive means of inter-mixture, part negro, part yellow, part white, part red, part monkey, part Jewish, part everything. [219]
  • "To be or not to be" Aryan? That is the question! And nothing more! All the doctrines concerning the absence of Race, concerning the vast racial confusion, all the spreading of racial jumbling at full pace, the esperanto-ism of the anus "Romain Rolland style," resulting in the greatest fornicating Babel are no more than destructive foul tricks, all emerging from the same Talmudic shop: "To the destruction of the Whites."
  • In the kingdom of the "fallen in the shit" the lunatics are king. [222-23]
  • You [Jews] terrify no one. The sun sinks, you swank about to the right, to the left. Europe forms up against you. [294]
  • Even the richest, the most superb. They continue to offer themselves. Indeed, their life is no more than a perpetual whoredom, more or less decorative, more or less seedy, more or less affected, sumptuous, pretentious. [299]

Les Beaux Draps ( A Fine Mess , 1941) [ edit ]

  • [There are] more Jews than ever in the streets, more Jews than ever in the press, more Jews than ever at the bar, the Opéra , the Comédie Française , in manufacturing, in banks. Paris and France under the sway of Freemasons and Jews more than ever and more arrogantly than ever before.
  • Cited in Wyatt Mason "Uncovering Céline" The New York Review of Books (14 January 2010).
  • From a review of the original French editions of Celine's antisemitiic writings, also including Bagatelles pour un massacre ( Trifles for a Massacre , 1937) and L'École des cadavres ( The School of Corpses , 1938).

About Louis-Ferdinand Céline [ edit ]

  • Oliver Kamm "One French literary hero needs to be forgotten" The Jewish Chronicle (24 September 2021)
  • "Louis-Ferdinand Céline," taken from his grandmother's and mother's first names, with his first novel. His second novel, Mort à crédit ( Death on the Installment Plan , 1936), his greatest work, moves back in time to his childhood on the Passage Choiseul , a commercial arcade in central Paris where his mother ran a lace shop. The family lived upstairs, suffocating from the odors emanating from the gas lighting. You can read the novel as a lower-class rewrite of Proust. Céline’s madeleine scene is a family puking on a ferry; his Albertine is Nora at a British boarding school, Meanwell College, where the smitten Ferdinand, a younger version of the Ferdinand Bardamu we meet in Voyage , resolves not to talk. The writing, far cruder and more physical than that of the first novel, was censored, and the first edition was full of white spaces where words and phrases had been cut.
  • Alice Kaplan "The Master of Blame" The New York Review of Books (21 July 2022)
  • Agnès Poirier "Cashing In on Céline’s Anti-Semitism" The New York Review of Books (12 January 2018)
  • The article concerns proposals to reprint antisemitic texts by Louis-Ferdinand Céline published between 1937 and 1941 and not reprinted in France since 1945. Publication was suspended in early 2018.

References [ edit ]

  • ↑ a b Letters to Milton Hindus (1947-1949), Les Cahiers de la NRF, Gallimard ISBN 2070134296

journey to the end of night quotes

  • 1894 births
  • 1961 deaths
  • Anti-communists
  • Novelists from France
  • People from Paris
  • Philosophical pessimists
  • Physicians from France
  • Anti-Semites

Navigation menu

Journey to the End of The Night by Louis-Ferdinand Céline

journey to the end of night quotes

The novel is a semi-autobiographical work that explores the harsh realities of life through the cynical and disillusioned eyes of the protagonist. The narrative follows his experiences from the trenches of World War I, through the African jungles, to the streets of America and the slums of Paris, showcasing the horrors of war, colonialism, and the dark side of human nature. The protagonist's journey is marked by his struggle with despair, loneliness, and the absurdity of existence, offering a bleak yet profound commentary on the human condition.

The 90th greatest book of all time

  • Comments (0)

If you're interested in seeing the ranking details on this book go here

This book is on the following lists:

  • 1st on The 500 best books of all time from Culture Café users (Culture Café)
  • 6th on Le Monde's 100 Books of the Century (Le Monde)
  • 6th on For The Love of Books (For The Love of Books)
  • 8th on The 25 Favorite Books of 100 Francophone Writers (Telerama)
  • 11th on 100 Best Novels, in Translation, Since 1900 (CounterPunch)
  • 13th on El Pais Favorite Books of 100 Spanish Authors (El Pais)
  • 51st on The 100 Greatest Novels of All Time: The List (The Observer)
  • 76th on 100 Essential Books (Bravo! Magazine)
  • 390th on Our Users' Favorite Books of All Time (The Greatest Books Users)
  • Best Books Ever (bookdepository.com)
  • Top 100 Works in World Literature (Norwegian Book Clubs, with the Norwegian Nobel Institute)
  • Världsbiblioteket (The World Library) (Tidningen Boken)
  • Donald Barthelme’s Reading List (Believer Mag)
  • The Bigger Read List (English PEN)
  • 1001 Books You Must Read Before You Die (The Book)
  • Harold Bloom's The Western Canon (The Western Canon (Book) by Harold Bloom)

Existentialist

Experimental, social & cultural fiction, world war i, create custom user list, purchase this book.

Journey to the End of the Night by Louis-Ferdinand Céline

general information | review summaries | our review | links | about the author

- Return to top of the page -

B+ : bleak but powerful

See our review for fuller assessment.

   From the Reviews : "It is anti- more or less everything you like to mention. It convinces the reader absolutely that the author has lived life at the bottom of the heap. (...) Journey to the End of the Night is immensely powerful. It is also witty and once the reader has started on the headlong journey, it is very difficult to jump off the train." - Antony Rouse, Daily Telegraph "If Parade's End is a chronicle of the First World War by a Tory modernist, then this is an account of the same subject by a cross between Henry Miller and Jack Kerouac. It's a cynical and angry spit at the world, related in prose that spikes and jabs all the way through." - Lesley McDowell, Independent on Sunday " Journey to the end of the night is a novel in the first person, and in what a first person: that of Bardamu, the most blackly humorous and disenchanted voice in all of French literature. And the hardest to resist; for this is a novel to do with persuasion, written in an aggressive yet insidiously rhythmic spoken French, able both to scandalise and charm its first, genteel readers. Céline re-created spoken French as a written form, and he did so because he so loathed respectability: he is a wonderful exponent of slang, of bawdy and of popular syntax, all of them as a corrective to the hypocrisy of received usage, that bland embellishment of a vile world. (...) Manheim's is only the second translation of the novel to have been made, so the question is simple: does it improve on the John Marks version of 1934 ? Unquestionably it does. It doesn't have the urgency or virtuosity of the French, but then no translation of Céline ever will. Manheim, however, is racier and verbally more enterprising than the inhibited Marks, and has also tried to liven up the punctuation, to take his version closer to a spoken English." - John Sturrock, London Review of Books "The classic Journey to the End of the Night has been unavailable in a hardbound edition for too long. It increased the French language to a greater degree than anything since the works of Rabelais, and stands with Joyce's Ulysses as the most important novel of wordplay in modern times." - Andrew Sinclair, The Times "M. Céline's strange book, though it was most eagerly received in France, will probably not stir up the same enthusiasm here. (...) But the book artistically seems important; and it will be studied by those seriously interested in how the modern novel develops. All critics must emphasize the vulgarity, the coarseness, the horror of the work. Yet the author is not a curious exploiter, offering scandal merely. He expresses a point of view: for him life is scandalous, he is disgusted with it. (...) In different degrees he and the late Herr Kafka may be regarded as fertilizing influences (though it would be dangerous to imitate his tone), having in common a measure of surréalisme , the one emotional, the other intellectual." - George Henry Perrott Buchanan, Times Literary Supplement "His writing is like a battle or a raging epidemic because he believed that only in the midst of war and disease do men become real. If life is a journey to annihilation then most of us find it easier to remain tourists; Céline would have liked to turn us into more generous fellow-passengers." - John Sturrock, Times Literary Supplement "Céline's vernacular usage and poetic turn of phrase mean that an apposite aphorism is never far away. (...) Céline's novel remains as readable and vital today as it was in the 1930s." - Matt Lewis, Times Literary Supplement    Quotes : "While Ralph Manheim's new translation of Céline's Journey to the End of the Night is not an improvement on John H.P. Marks's fine 1934 version, it is good to see Céline being brought back to the public's attention. (...) In 1932, with Journey to the End of the Night , Céline 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. (...) Céline was the last of the grand vituperators, a gourmet of disgust." - Anatole Broyard, The New York Times Book Review (16/1/1983) "Indeed, if Ulysses is the great modernist novel most inspired by a desire for humanistic inclusion, then Journey is its antithesis: a stream of misanthropic consciousness, almost unrelieved by any warmth or fellow-feeling. (...) What else is there in Journey to relieve the succession of taunts, jibes and foul-mouthed insults Céline flings against the world ? A great deal. There are so many aphorisms -- at least one per page -- that the whole reads like La Rochefoucauld on LSD. (...) Journey is no political picaresque. Rather, the novel is a furious attempt to place one man's consciousness at the epicenter of a world that is exploding under the centripetal influences of capitalism, imperialism, consumerism and licentiousness." - Will Self, The New York Times Book Review (12/10/2006) Please note that these ratings solely represent the complete review 's biased interpretation and subjective opinion of the actual reviews and do not claim to accurately reflect or represent the views of the reviewers. Similarly the illustrative quotes chosen here are merely those the complete review subjectively believes represent the tenor and judgment of the review as a whole. We acknowledge (and remind and warn you) that they may, in fact, be entirely unrepresentative of the actual reviews by any other measure.

The complete review 's Review :

[ Note : While the Ralph Manheim translation (1983) is the one currently in print, I only had the (a print copy of) the John H.P. Marks translation (1934) at hand, and all translations from the French below are, unless otherwise indicated, Marks'. (Comparisons to the Manheim translation suggests the differences between the two are, for the selected passages and quotes, not significant enough to warrant the trouble of seeking out all of those.)]
     De temps en temps montaient des bruits de pas et l'écho entrait de plus en plus fort dans ma chambre, bourdonnait, s'estompait... Silence. Je regardais encore s'il se passait quelque chose dehors, en face. Rien qu'en moi que ça se passait, à me poser toujours la même question.      J'ai fini par m'endormir sur la question, dans ma nuit à moi, ce cercueil, tellement j'étais fatigué de marcher et de ne trouver rien.      [From time to time echoes and the sound of footsteps came up into my room, growing louder and louder, humming and fading away again ... Silence. I looked again to see if anything was happening outside, across the way. It was only inside me that things were happening, as I went on and on asking myself the same question.      I fell asleep in the end on that same question, in my own private night like a coffin; I ws so tired from walking so far and finding nothing.]
Puisque nous sommes que des enclos de tripes tièdes et mal pourries nous aurons toujours du mal avec le sentiment. Amoureux ce n'est rien c'est tenir ensemble qui est difficile. L'ordure elle, ne cherche ni à durer, ni à croître. Ici, sur ce point, nous sommes bien plus malheureux que la merde, cet enragement à persévérer dans notre état constitue l'incroyable torture. [Since we are nothing but packages of warm and rotten tripes, we shall always have difficulty with sentiment. To love is nothing, it's hanging together that's so hard. Muck, on the other hand, makes no attempt either to endure or to increase. In this particular matter we are far more wretched than filth itself, with our frantic desire to last out as we are which constitutes such infinite torture.]
C'est difficile d'arriver à l'essentiel, même en ce qui concerne la guerre, la fantaisie résiste longtemps. [It's difficult to get at the essential truth at the bottom of anything, and even in the case of war imagination dies hard.]
     On est retournés chacun dans la guerre. Et puis il s'est passé des choses et encore des choses, qu'il est pas facile de raconter à présent, à cause que ceux d'aujourd'hui ne les comprendraient déjà plus.      [Each of us returned to his own war. And things happened, a whole host of things went on happening, which it isn't really easy to talk about now, because nowadays people wouldn't understand them any more.]
I let myself be hounded towards the tropics where I was told you only had not to drink too much and to behave fairly well to make your way at once.
     C'était comme une plaie triste la rue qui n'en finissait plus, avec nous au fond, nous autres, d'un bord à l'autre, d'une peine à l'autre, vers le bout qu'on ne voit jamais, le bout de toutes les rues du monde.      [Like a running sore this unending street, with all of us at the bottom of it, filling it from side to side, from one sorrow to the next, moving towards an end no one has ever seen, the end of all the streets in all the world.]
Ça ne vous servira à rien ici vos études, mon garçon ! Vous n'êtes pas venu ici pour penser, mais pour faire les gestes qu'on vous commandera d'exécuter ... Nous n'avons pas besoin d'imaginatifs dans notre usine. C'est de chimpanzés dont nous avons besoin ... [Your studies won't be any use to you here, my lad. You haven't come here to think, but to go through the motions that you'll be told to make ... We've no use for intellectuals in this outfit. What we need is chimpanzees.]
     Quand on n'a pas d'argent à offrir aux pauvres, il vaut mieux se taire. Quand on leur parle d'autre chose que d'argent, on les trompe, on ment, presque toujours. Les riches, c'est facile à amuser, rien qu'avec des glaces par exemple, pour qu'ils s'y contemplent, puisqu'il n'y a rien de mieux au monde à regarder que les riches.      [When you've no money to offer the poor, you might as well shut up. If you start talking to them about anything else besides money, you are almost invariably tricking them, lying to them. The rich can be easily amused -- mirrors, for instance, in which they can see themselves, will do, for there is nothing better to look at in the world than the rich.]
Moralement, nous n'étions pas à notre aise. Trop de fantômes, par-ci, par-là. [Morally speaking, our consciences weren't entirely easy. There were too many ghosts, one way and another.]
En Afrique, j'avais certes connu un genre de solitude assez brutale, mais l'isolement dans cette fourmilière américaine prenait une tournure plus acca- blante encore. [In Africa I had indeed found a sufficiently frightful kind of loneliness but the isolation of this American ant heap was even more shattering.]
Elle s'éloignait au passé notre trentaine sur des rives coriaces et pauvrement regrettées. C'était même pas la peine de se retourner pour les reconnaître les rives. On n'avait pas perdu grand-chose en vieillissant. [The time when we had been in our thirties was slipping way back into the past -- cruel, meagrely regretted shores. It wasn't even worth while turning to look back on those shores. We hadn't missed much by growing old.]
I felt my self-respect, which was about to leave me anyway, slipping still further from me, then going completely and at last definitely gone, as if officially removed.
On en a plein les mains de ce qui reste de l'esprit, on en est tout englué, grotesque, méprisant, puant. Tout va s'écrouler, Ferdinand, tout s'écroule, je vous le prédis, moi le vieux Baryton, et pour dans pas longtemps encore ! [We have our hands full of the remnants of our human understanding, sticky with them, grotesque, contemptible, putrid ... Everything will crumble, Ferdinand; everything is crumbling. I predict it, I, Baryton, an old man, and it won't be long now, either !]
On n'explique rien. Le monde ne sait que vous tuer comme un dormeur quand il se retourne le monde, sur vous, comme un dormeur tue ses puces. Voilà qui serait certes mourir bien sottement, que je me dis, comme tout le monde, c'est-à-dire. Faire confiance aux hommes c'est déjà se faire tuer un peu. [There is nothing you can explain. The world only knows how to kill you, turning on you and crushing you as a sleeper kills his fleas. That would surely be a very stupid sort of way to die, I thought, the way every one dies. To trust in men is itself to let one self be killed a little.]

- M.A.Orthofer , 20 May 2021

About the Author :

       Louis-Ferdinand Céline (1894-1961) was one of the leading as well as most notorious French authors of the 20th century.

© 2021 the complete review Main | the New | the Best | the Rest | Review Index | Links

Plot Summary? We’re just getting started.

Add this title to our requested Study Guides list!

logo

Journey to the End of the Night

Louis-Ferdinand Celine

Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 1932

Plot Summary

Continue your reading experience

SuperSummary Plot Summaries provide a quick, full synopsis of a text. But SuperSummary Study Guides — available only to subscribers — provide so much more!

Join now to access our Study Guides library, which offers chapter-by-chapter summaries and comprehensive analysis on more than 5,000 literary works from novels to nonfiction to poetry.

See for yourself. Check out our sample guides:

logo

Download Fiction Sample

David And Goliath

Download Nonfiction Sample

Whales Weep Not!

Download Poetry Sample

A SuperSummary Plot Summary provides a quick, full synopsis of a text.

A SuperSummary Study Guide — a modern alternative to Sparknotes & CliffsNotes — provides so much more, including chapter-by-chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and important quotes.

See the difference for yourself. Check out this sample Study Guide:

Toni Morrison

  • International edition
  • Australia edition
  • Europe edition

Louis-Ferdinand Celine in 1955

Céline's journey to the cutting edge of literature

' I'd give all of Baudelaire for an Olympic swimmer," Céline insisted. It's a provocative statement, typical of Louis-Ferdinand Destouches , who used the nom de plume of Céline. Doctor, linguist, shagger of showgirls and noted antisemite, Céline is now widely acknowledged as the greatest French prose stylist of the 20th century, despite, or perhaps partly because of, the controversy that still dogs the man and his work.

I have French friends who point-blank refuse to read Céline because of the antisemitism, but there is a strong tradition in France of not just indulging, but almost demanding bad behaviour and outrage from its writers (I refer you to Houellebecq, Gide, Cocteau, Colette, Genet and Baudelaire). It tells you a lot about France, in terms of both literature and politics, that after disgracing himself during the Hitler years, Céline was back on the shelves in 1949.

Céline has always had a loyal if small, following in the US with the beats and other beardy counterculture intellectuals (they like to skip over the Jew-bashing, but hey, Ezra Pound got away with it too).

His popularity was based on two opposing elements in his work. The often colloquial, coarse and simple vocabulary he employed (his man-of-the-people credentials, the telling-it-like-it-is, although Céline also has a Captain Haddock-like talent for recherché invective) is heightened by the absence of long, aristocratic, Proustian sentences. But the straightforward language is coupled, especially in the mid-period work, with a modernist disdain for clear exposition and holding the loathsome bourgeois reader's hand. So, boosted by his antiwar spleen and snarling at authority, Céline pulls off the trick of being Henry Miller, John Steinbeck and James Joyce all at the same time.

In Guignol's Band and its sequel London Bridge , you really have to pay close attention to the action to know exactly what's going on, although it's the ride with language that you're paying for – what the French critics often refer to as Céline's "délire".

Journey to the End of Night is Céline's first novel. Published in 1932, it made him an instant literary star. With typical immodesty, Céline felt he was robbed of the Prix Goncourt (won by the now obscure Guy Mazeline) but it didn't matter. Trotsky, Jean-Paul Sartre and Simone de Beauvoir were fans (how the left loved him then).

Journey to the End of Night is the most novel-like of Céline's writings. It has a huge scope, full of pent-up experience and dark lyricism, starting off with the first world war (where Céline served as a professional soldier), encompassing the French African colonies and the industrial might of Detroit (again drawing on the author's own travels). It's like All Quiet on the Western Front , Heart of Darkness and The Grapes of Wrath squeezed into one budget edition. All this is served up with Céline's wit and cynicism, although his characteristic slangy style isn't operating at full power, and there is a stab at a plot. The narrator, Ferdinand Bardamu, follows a character called Robinson (a nod to Crusoe), through these locations. It's one of the longest road-trips in literature.

For all the vulgarity and argot present in Journey , the most striking aspect of the book is the energy and industry involved. In some of his later interviews Céline suggested that he wrote for money. There's no doubt that, in common with many individuals with little money, Céline was concerned with cash, but Journey wasn't an attempt to produce a bestseller; it was an attempt to be number one, to take over, to kill everyone else in the room.

The book's triumph is in its tone. Writers had used it before, but I'd maintain that Céline's great contribution to modern literature is the elevation of sarcasm, of a mordant, sneering cynicism (what the French call narquois ) to an art form, a tone that would become a staple of late-20th-century writing, through to Johnny Rotten gurning at his audience.

I've never been able to find any evidence for the influence, but JD Salinger studied French and was in France during the time of Journey 's success. Maybe it's just synchronicity, but I have this feeling that Holden Caulfield has a fragment of Bardamu in him, although, of course, his disaffection is much kinder and more soulful than Céline's.

Mea Culpa , Céline's denunciation of the Soviet Union after a tour in 1936, cut off most of his support from the left, but it was his "pamphlet" of 1937 that was to do him considerable damage. Always referred to as a pamphlet (overlooking the sense of "lampoon" in French usage), Trifles for a Massacre is in fact a novel-length text, parts of which are some of the weirdest things I've ever read, seemingly predating postmodernism, William Burroughs and the theatre of the absurd, and truly deserving of the title "delirium". It's out there with Finnegans Wake (although two years earlier), and but for the fact it hadn't been synthesised yet, you'd be wondering if Dr Destouches hadn't scored a tab of LSD.

A few of the derogatory swipes against Jews here might be interpreted as a sort of Swiftian satire (Gide apparently thought Céline was joking), but in case the reader was in any doubt we get the hackneyed charges of an international Zionist conspiracy from Hollywood to Moscow again and again, and Céline does actually liken Jews to "bugs", although he states that as individuals he has no problem with them. Publishing an antisemitic harangue in 1937 with the word "Aryan" in the text and "massacre" in the title is a tough one to explain away, especially as he wrote two more similar fulminations.

Was Céline a fascist? Not quite, although his rabid antisemitism (and by extension his anticommunism) made him popular in those circles. Was he a collaborator? He was convicted for it after the war, although with calm hindsight you could argue he wasn't; but many of his associates were collaborators, and he was just standing too close to them. During the war he actually wrote to the Germans asking for help in obtaining tons of paper so his work could be printed (an act of ego comparable to PG Wodehouse taking up the mike for the Boche while interned).

Guignol's Band was published in 1944, and like much of Céline's work revolves around the first world war. Céline was lucky to get out of it early on, receiving a "Blighty one" and being posted to London, where Guignol's Band is set. Curiously, the narrator is also called Ferdinand, and he gives a foreigner's view of wartime London, as the low-life characters he meets in pubs and brothels are seldom English.

It's no surprise that Irvine Welsh is a fan of Céline; if you added a nae or two, some heroin and a sprinkling of four-letters words, Guignol's Band could be his new novel.

Céline's artistic manifesto is promulgated in a preface to Guignol's Band . He announces, among other things, "I annoy everyone" and "Jazz toppled the waltz … you write 'telegraphically' or you don't write at all." Guignol's Band is almost the final stage of Céline's "telegraphic" style, the nearly complete reliance on ellipses and exclamation marks. It's not easy to write a pastiche of Gide, Proust, Giono, Mauriac, Sartre or Camus, but you could teach a six-year-old to do Céline. It's a simple, but highly effective invention.

Guignol's Band assures us that there are some things that never change. "He couldn't be employed," Ferdinand says of a Slav, "and then he really drank too much, even for England." One of the pimps makes the joke that has survived to this day. The weather's not that bad in England: it only rains twice a year … for six months at a time.

London Bridge continues Ferdinand's story as he gets involved with a gas-mask project and an underage girl (preempting Nabokov, although London Bridge didn't get to the bookshops until 1964). Céline's account of a Zeppelin bombing raid is one of the highlights of the book.

Alma's reissued editions rely heavily on past American translations, so some of it may sound odd to British ears, given the British setting. There is also a particular problem with Céline in that he falls very much into the untranslatable bracket; much of his appeal is in the tone and musicality of his language, and its vast register. He needs a translator of genius rather than mere skill.

London Bridge had to wait 20 years to reach the bookshops because Céline chose to decamp with the Vichy government and ended up incarcerated in Denmark for 18 months. He toyed with the idea of doing a third volume of Guignol , but got no further than an outline, which is in the Pléiade edition of his works, the ultimate accolade for a writer in France.

The period on the run and in chokey gave Céline the inspiration for his final great performance, the Château trilogy (and of course, a trilogy without an ounce of repentance – Céline just doesn't do repentance – but rather a lamentation on his persecution).

Here, because, I assume he was revelling in the freedom of not caring about popularity any more, and because the story as such consists of Céline wallowing in himself, along with undramatic incidents and conversations, his style stands naked. Pure style, nothing else.

For me, Céline's best work is at the beginning and the end, Journey to the End of Night and the Château trilogy (he badly needs an editor in both Guignol's Band and London Bridge , which I find a bit meandering and overwritten). Born in the shadow of entrenched realism and naturalism, Céline ripped up the textbook. He wasn't the first French writer to use a colloquial style, but he was the first to use it so relentlessly and powerfully, to create a brand, the rant, whether it was delirious, lyrical or raging. If you read French, his prose is simply mesmerising.

There is a shamelessness and an uncrushability about Céline that many successful writers have (in an Anglo-Saxon context Daniel Defoe and Jeffrey Archer come to mind). Part of Céline's appeal is that you can't imagine him holding back, not saying something for fear of offending. Offending was his business. And he worked for it. If you listen to recordings of his interviews, you hear the rapid, insistent speech of a determined man.

Allegedly, he died on the day in 1961 when he finished his last book, the final Château volume, Rigadoon (where the Jews have been replaced by the Chinese as his chief bugbear), dedicated "To Animals" (behind the nihilist, a softy with a parrot and a cat). In Rigadoon he makes this prediction: "I'm absolutely Pléiade … like La Fontaine, Clément Marot, Du Bellay and Rabelais eh! And Ronsard! … I tell you if I keep a little cool, in two, three centuries I'll be helping people sit the baccalauréat …" He was in the schools 30 years later.

  • Louis-Ferdinand Céline

Internet Archive Audio

journey to the end of night quotes

  • This Just In
  • Grateful Dead
  • Old Time Radio
  • 78 RPMs and Cylinder Recordings
  • Audio Books & Poetry
  • Computers, Technology and Science
  • Music, Arts & Culture
  • News & Public Affairs
  • Spirituality & Religion
  • Radio News Archive

journey to the end of night quotes

  • Flickr Commons
  • Occupy Wall Street Flickr
  • NASA Images
  • Solar System Collection
  • Ames Research Center

journey to the end of night quotes

  • All Software
  • Old School Emulation
  • MS-DOS Games
  • Historical Software
  • Classic PC Games
  • Software Library
  • Kodi Archive and Support File
  • Vintage Software
  • CD-ROM Software
  • CD-ROM Software Library
  • Software Sites
  • Tucows Software Library
  • Shareware CD-ROMs
  • Software Capsules Compilation
  • CD-ROM Images
  • ZX Spectrum
  • DOOM Level CD

journey to the end of night quotes

  • Smithsonian Libraries
  • FEDLINK (US)
  • Lincoln Collection
  • American Libraries
  • Canadian Libraries
  • Universal Library
  • Project Gutenberg
  • Children's Library
  • Biodiversity Heritage Library
  • Books by Language
  • Additional Collections

journey to the end of night quotes

  • Prelinger Archives
  • Democracy Now!
  • Occupy Wall Street
  • TV NSA Clip Library
  • Animation & Cartoons
  • Arts & Music
  • Computers & Technology
  • Cultural & Academic Films
  • Ephemeral Films
  • Sports Videos
  • Videogame Videos
  • Youth Media

Search the history of over 866 billion web pages on the Internet.

Mobile Apps

  • Wayback Machine (iOS)
  • Wayback Machine (Android)

Browser Extensions

Archive-it subscription.

  • Explore the Collections
  • Build Collections

Save Page Now

Capture a web page as it appears now for use as a trusted citation in the future.

Please enter a valid web address

  • Donate Donate icon An illustration of a heart shape

Louis-Ferdinand Céline, Journey to the end of the night

Bookreader item preview, share or embed this item, flag this item for.

  • Graphic Violence
  • Explicit Sexual Content
  • Hate Speech
  • Misinformation/Disinformation
  • Marketing/Phishing/Advertising
  • Misleading/Inaccurate/Missing Metadata

[Amazon]

plus-circle Add Review comment Reviews

453 Previews

12 Favorites

DOWNLOAD OPTIONS

No suitable files to display here.

EPUB and PDF access not available for this item.

IN COLLECTIONS

Uploaded by Lotu Tii on December 10, 2013

SIMILAR ITEMS (based on metadata)

  • Quote of the Day
  • Picture Quotes

End Of Journey Quotes

Standart top banner.

journey to the end of night quotes

It is good to have an end to journey towards; but it is the journey that matters, in the end.

Success is a journey, not a destination. The doing is often more important than the outcome.

I may not have gone where I intended to go, but I think I have ended up where I intended to be.

To finish the moment, to find the journey's end in every step of the road, to live the greatest number of good hours, is wisdom.

Every day is a journey, and the journey itself is home.

Once you have traveled, the voyage never ends, but is played out over and over again in the quietest chambers. The mind can never break off from the journey.

journey to the end of night quotes

Once you have traveled, the voyage never ends.

We shall not cease from exploration, and the end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we started and know the place for the first time.

Find the journey's end in every step.

Never make your home in a place. Make a home for yourself inside your own head. You'll find what you need to furnish it - memory, friends you can trust, love of learning, and other such things. That way it will go with you wherever you journey.

Does the road wind up-hill all the way? Yes, to the very end.

They spoke less and less between them until at last they were silent altogether as is often the way with travelers approaching the end of a journey.

To live the greatest number of good hours is wisdom.

. . . long journeys are strange things: if we were always to continue in the same mind we are in at the end of a journey, we should never stir from the place we were then in . . .

Does the road wind up-hill all the way? Yes, to the very end. Will the day's journey take the whole long day? From morn to night, my friend.

Nothing is so awesomely unfamiliar as the familiar that discloses itself at the end of a journey. Nothing shakes the heart so much as meeting-far, far away-what you last met at home.

The years seem to rush by now, and I think of death as a fast approaching end of a journey-double and treble reason for loving as well as working while it is day.

Though the most beautiful creature were waiting for me at the end of a journey or a walk; though the carpet were of silk, the curtains of the morning clouds; the chairs and sofa stuffed with cygnet's down; the food manna, the wine beyond claret, the window opening on Winander Mere, I should not feel -or rather my happiness would not be so fine, as my solitude is sublime.

long journeys are strange things: if we were always to continue in the same mind we are in at the end of a journey, we should never stir from the place we were then in: but Providence in kindness to us causes us to forget it. It is much the same with lying-in women. Heaven permits this forgetfulness that the world may be peopled, and that folks may take journeys to Provence.

My father was my mother's home, the one place that she knew she could be safe. It was all a journey of faith for him, and I think he felt like if you don't find more love and understanding at the end of a journey like that, then you are lost - and if you only find hate and resentment, it will destroy you. I believe that.

last adds STANDART BOTTOM BANNER

Send report.

  • The author didn't say that
  • There is a mistake in the text of this quote
  • The quote belongs to another author
  • Other error

Top Authors

' class=

Get Social with AzQuotes

Follow AzQuotes on Facebook, Twitter and Google+. Every day we present the best quotes! Improve yourself, find your inspiration, share with friends

SIDE STANDART BANNER

  • Javascript and RSS feeds
  • WordPress plugin
  • ES Version AZQuotes.ES
  • Submit Quotes
  • Privacy Policy

Login with your account

Create account, find your account.

CinemaBlend

CinemaBlend

30 Back To The Future Trilogy Quotes And Scenes That Stand The Test Of Time

Posted: March 5, 2024 | Last updated: March 5, 2024

<p>                     One thing I love about sci-fi movies from the past is just how each decade envisioned the future. The ‘50s had a lot of flying saucers, and the ‘60s and ‘70s dialed it back a bit, featuring a lot less theremin and a bit more paranoia. It was also a very good time for Godzilla. But ‘80s sci-fi, like <em>The Running Man</em>, was a lot darker. There was almost an apocalyptic tone to some of the best sci-fi movies of the ‘80s, which is why I find the decade so fascinating.                   </p>                                      <p>                     Sure, there were some fun ‘80s sci-fi films, like <em>Short Circuit, </em>and there are even some fun ones on this list. But a lot of the best ‘80s sci-fi flicks were super grim. Hop in the DeLorean, and read all about them.                   </p>

Prepare for some serious stuff in this list of classics.

Greetings, time travellers! As you are now reading this very list, you’re undoubtedly a fan of the adventures of the Back to the Future Trilogy, which represent some of the best sci-fi movies ever created! Well buckle up, as we’re about to hit 88 miles per hour, celebrating the many memorable quotes and moments that stand the test of time.

<p>                     Someone who lent his voice to two hit songs on the Back to the Future soundtrack and appears in the movie as a faculty member is Huey Lewis. The funny cameo was the musician’s first try at acting, which he would do again in films like 2000’s Duets, as Gwyneth Paltrow’s father, or the 1998 sci-fi flick Sphere as a helicopter pilot, in a recurring spot in the One Tree Hill cast, or as himself on a 2021 episode of The Blacklist and a Funny or Die short poking fun at American Psycho’s use of his song, “Hip to Be a Square.”                    </p>                                      <p>                     Lewis also continues to voice junkyard dog Bulworth on Disney’s Puppy Dog Pals, put out his latest album with the News, Weather, in 2020, but does not tour anymore since Ménière's disease has left him unable to hear well enough to sing.                   </p>                                      <p>                     Luckily, the Oscar-nominated music of Huey Lewis and the News will, thankfully, live on in this sci-fi classic along with the rest of Back to the Future cast, no matter what they are known for doing today, and will always be remembered for their contribution to pop culture simply by starring in this phenomenal film.                   </p>

“I’m afraid you’re just too darn loud.”

This short but sweet Back to the Future line is one of the most iconic not only because of when it’s said, but also because of who said it. This gag is only funnier when, after hearing “The Power of Love” playing on the soundtrack, Huey Lewis himself pops up to give Marty and his bandmates the bad news. 

<p>                     Who wants to remember Biff Tannen in any moment other than those times he was foiled by the family McFly? Well, in one of his less creeptastic moments in <em>Back to the Future</em> history, his taunting of young George did leave us with one of many of the iconic catchphrases this movie claims as its own.                   </p>

“Hello? Hell-ooo? Anybody home?!”

Who wants to remember Biff Tannen in any moment other than those times he was foiled by the family McFly? Well, in one of his less creeptastic moments in Back to the Future history, his taunting of young George did leave us with one of many of the iconic catchphrases this movie claims as its own.

<p>                     Doctor Emmett L. Brown landed his “eureka” moment twice in<em> Back to the Future</em>, as he noted both the speed and voltage needed to execute time travel. But out of those two moments, “1.21 Gigawatts!” is probably the more memorable; and that’s only because of how Christopher Lloyd delivers that line in particular with such frantic urgency.                   </p>

“1.21 Gigawatts!”

Doctor Emmett L. Brown landed his “eureka” moment twice in Back to the Future , as he noted both the speed and voltage needed to execute time travel. But out of those two moments, “1.21 Gigawatts!” is probably the more memorable; and that’s only because of how Christopher Lloyd delivers that line in particular with such frantic urgency.

<p>                     Between seeing how Marty and Jennifer aged, and how Michael J. Fox played both his own son and daughter in <em>Back to the Future: Part II</em>, the contents of this moment are only matched by the special effects trickery that made it possible. You never forget the first time you saw the McFlys around the same dinner table in 2015.                    </p>

The McFly Family Of The Future

Between seeing how Marty and Jennifer aged, and how Michael J. Fox played both his own son and daughter in Back to the Future: Part II , the contents of this moment are only matched by the special effects trickery that made it possible. You never forget the first time you saw the McFlys around the same dinner table in 2015. 

<p>                     While Marty McFly is technically the protagonist of <em>Back to the Future</em>, seeing <em>Part III</em> not only allow Doc Brown to fall in love with his beloved Clara (Mary Steenburgen), but also wind up happily ever after with her was a total delight. Giving Marty and Jennifer one last word of advice to make their future a good one, the family Brown sped off into time, in a very happy ending.                   </p>

Doc And Clara’s Happy Ending

While Marty McFly is technically the protagonist of Back to the Future , seeing Part III not only allow Doc Brown to fall in love with his beloved Clara (Mary Steenburgen), but also wind up happily ever after with her was a total delight. Giving Marty and Jennifer one last word of advice to make their future a good one, the family Brown sped off into time, in a very happy ending.

<p>                     While he advises Doc to use an actual bulletproof vest in <em>Back to the Future</em>, a moment from <em>Back to the Future: Part II</em> suggests that he learned a thing or two from Clint Eastwood before heading to the old west. Pulling the same move the western icon used in <em>A Fistful of Dollars</em>, which is the movie Tangent 1985 Biff is watching in the hot tub before their confrontation, Marty saves himself once and for all in <em>Back to the Future: Part III.</em>                   </p>

Marty Learns A Lesson From Clint Eastwood

While he advises Doc to use an actual bulletproof vest in Back to the Future , a moment from Back to the Future: Part II suggests that he learned a thing or two from Clint Eastwood before heading to the old west. Pulling the same move the western icon used in A Fistful of Dollars , which is the movie Tangent 1985 Biff is watching in the hot tub before their confrontation, Marty saves himself once and for all in Back to the Future: Part III.

<p>                     The ending to <em>Back to the Future </em>is -- believe it or not -- a source of controversy. While <a href="https://www.cinemablend.com/new/Why-Crispin-Glover-Had-Serious-Problem-With-Back-Future-Ending-89457.html">Crispin Glover and Lea Thompson were both upset</a> with the McFlys' newfound wealth, it can’t be denied that it was a huge shift from the versions of those people we were used to. It’s still one of the biggest third act twists that sticks the landing each time when we see how the changes Marty made to the past affected his family in the present.                   </p>

Marty Seeing How His Trip To 1955 Affected His Family

The ending to Back to the Future is -- believe it or not -- a source of controversy. While Crispin Glover and Lea Thompson were both upset with the McFlys' newfound wealth, it can’t be denied that it was a huge shift from the versions of those people we were used to. It’s still one of the biggest third act twists that sticks the landing each time when we see how the changes Marty made to the past affected his family in the present.

<p>                     Through meeting his great-great grandparents Seamus and Maggie McFly (Michael J. Fox and Lea Thompson), young Marty eventually learned a thing or two about standing on your own two feet. Thanks to that inspiration, the man known as “Clint Eastwood” not only avoids being shot down in <em>Back To The Future: Part III</em>, but Marty also avoids the tragic accident that ends his music career.                    </p>

Marty Learns A Lesson From His Great-Great-Grandparents

Through meeting his great-great grandparents Seamus and Maggie McFly (Michael J. Fox and Lea Thompson), young Marty eventually learned a thing or two about standing on your own two feet. Thanks to that inspiration, the man known as “Clint Eastwood” not only avoids being shot down in Back To The Future: Part III , but Marty also avoids the tragic accident that ends his music career. 

<p>                     One of the greatest pearls of wisdom from <em>Back to the Future</em> happens to be this oft repeated phrase. Inspiring George McFly to go out with Lorraine Baines, Marty takes this piece of wisdom from Doc, and gifts it to his future father. Which, in turn, sets George on the path to becoming a well-known sci-fi author, spouting that wisdom right back to his son.                   </p>

“If you put your mind to it, you can accomplish anything.”

One of the greatest pearls of wisdom from Back to the Future happens to be this oft repeated phrase. Inspiring George McFly to go out with Lorraine Baines, Marty takes this piece of wisdom from Doc, and gifts it to his future father. Which, in turn, sets George on the path to becoming a well-known sci-fi author, spouting that wisdom right back to his son.

<p>                     Ok, so you may or may not remember this line from <em>Back to the Future: Part III</em>, and there’s a good reason for that. This is the climactic moment where Marty waves off Mad Dog Tannen’s taunts and sticks up for himself with three simple words. If you grew up on the TV edit, this is the version you’d remember better, as the theatrical cut was a bit more profane.                    </p>

“He’s an idiot!”

Ok, so you may or may not remember this line from Back to the Future: Part III , and there’s a good reason for that. This is the climactic moment where Marty waves off Mad Dog Tannen’s taunts and sticks up for himself with three simple words. If you grew up on the TV edit, this is the version you’d remember better, as the theatrical cut was a bit more profane. 

<p>                     For someone who goes around warning everyone about the dangers of time travel, Doc Brown certainly likes to break his own rules. Not only does he use a bulletproof vest to save himself in 1985, but in <em>Back to the Future: Part II</em>, he talks to his 1955 counterpart for a spell. Rule breaking and dangerous paradoxes aside, it’s a heartwarming moment where the same person learns from themselves in a most peculiar way.                    </p>

1985 Doc Brown Has A Heart To Heart With 1955 Doc

For someone who goes around warning everyone about the dangers of time travel, Doc Brown certainly likes to break his own rules. Not only does he use a bulletproof vest to save himself in 1985, but in Back to the Future: Part II , he talks to his 1955 counterpart for a spell. Rule breaking and dangerous paradoxes aside, it’s a heartwarming moment where the same person learns from themselves in a most peculiar way. 

<p>                     While the series is a mix of wide-eyed optimism and well-timed snark, <em>Back to the Future: Part III</em> has to be one of the most sentimental entries. Even with Doc Brown meeting his past self in <em>Part II</em>, the moment where Doc and Marty take a picture in front of the face of the future Hill Valley clock tower is a beautiful full circle moment that never misses your heart.                   </p>

Doc And Marty’s Photo With The Clock Tower’s Face

While the series is a mix of wide-eyed optimism and well-timed snark, Back to the Future: Part III has to be one of the most sentimental entries. Even with Doc Brown meeting his past self in Part II , the moment where Doc and Marty take a picture in front of the face of the future Hill Valley clock tower is a beautiful full circle moment that never misses your heart.

<p>                     Oh Biff. As if it wasn’t bad enough that he hangs around with a group of buttheads, <em>Back to the Future</em> truly establishes him as a creep and a bully. That status makes the repeated history of himself, and his ancestors, crashing into manure trucks even more hysterical; as it couldn’t have happened to a worse guy!                    </p>

Biff And The Gang Crash Into The Manure Truck

Oh Biff. As if it wasn’t bad enough that he hangs around with a group of buttheads, Back to the Future truly establishes him as a creep and a bully. That status makes the repeated history of himself, and his ancestors, crashing into manure trucks even more hysterical; as it couldn’t have happened to a worse guy! 

<p>                     Though it feels like something that’s been a part of the franchise’s fabric since square one, <em>Back to the Future: Part II</em> is the film in which we’re introduced to the world calling Marty McFly “chicken.” Starting with Griff Tannen and being repeated by frenemy Needles (Flea) and Buford “Mad Dog” Tannen, each instance has become a consistent reference in the overall story of Marty’s journey.                   </p>

“What’s wrong, McFly? Chicken?”

Though it feels like something that’s been a part of the franchise’s fabric since square one, Back to the Future: Part II is the film in which we’re introduced to the world calling Marty McFly “chicken.” Starting with Griff Tannen and being repeated by frenemy Needles (Flea) and Buford “Mad Dog” Tannen, each instance has become a consistent reference in the overall story of Marty’s journey.

<p>                     We could practically make a list of “Great Scott” moments that landed in the <em>Back to the Future</em> trilogy, as there’s so many pitfalls and perils that Marty and Doc had to work through. And you could bet one of the top entries would come from <em>Part II</em>, when 1985 Marty tells Doc that he’s back <em>from</em> the future and stuck in 1955.                   </p>

“I’m back… I’m back from the future.”

We could practically make a list of “Great Scott” moments that landed in the Back to the Future trilogy, as there’s so many pitfalls and perils that Marty and Doc had to work through. And you could bet one of the top entries would come from Part II , when 1985 Marty tells Doc that he’s back from the future and stuck in 1955.

<p>                     “You know that new sound you’re lookin’ for? Well listen to <em>this?</em>" That famous line saw Marvin Berry (Harry Waters Jr.) introducing his cousin Chuck to the sweet sounds of “Johnny B. Goode,” which debuted at the “Enchantment Under The Sea” Dance. While Marty digressed into a more heavy metal version that 1955’s kids weren’t ready for yet; their kids were bound to <em>love</em> it.                   </p>

Johnny B. Goode Premieres At The Enchantment Under The Sea Dance

“You know that new sound you’re lookin’ for? Well listen to this? " That famous line saw Marvin Berry (Harry Waters Jr.) introducing his cousin Chuck to the sweet sounds of “Johnny B. Goode,” which debuted at the “Enchantment Under The Sea” Dance. While Marty digressed into a more heavy metal version that 1955’s kids weren’t ready for yet; their kids were bound to love it.

<p>                     <a href="https://www.cinemablend.com/movies/movies-featuring-professional-musicians">Professional musicians in movies</a> is no strange feat, be it in cameos like <em>Back to the Future: Part III’s </em>Hill Valley Festival band, or in full on starring roles. On the briefer side of that coin, fans of ‘80s rock group ZZ Top were treated to an 1885 version of their song “Doubleback,” complete with the usual instrument flip the boys were known for.                   </p>

ZZ Top Plays The Hill Valley Festival

Professional musicians in movies is no strange feat, be it in cameos like Back to the Future: Part III’s Hill Valley Festival band, or in full on starring roles. On the briefer side of that coin, fans of ‘80s rock group ZZ Top were treated to an 1885 version of their song “Doubleback,” complete with the usual instrument flip the boys were known for.

<p>                     Among the <a href="https://www.cinemablend.com/news/2551779/back-to-the-future-crazy-differences-between-the-final-movie-and-its-first-draft">differences from <em>Back to the Future’s</em> first draft</a> was an ending where Marty McFly cancels out the invention of Rock n’ Roll. While we don’t see anything that wild at the end of the first movie, there is a question of whether or not <em>Star Trek</em> or <em>Star Wars</em> exists in Marty’s world, as his prank to get young George McFly to ask Lorraine Baines out on a date included this copyright nightmare that almost wasn’t.                   </p>

George Gets A Visit From Darth Vader Of The Planet Vulcan

Among the differences from Back to the Future’s first draft was an ending where Marty McFly cancels out the invention of Rock n’ Roll. While we don’t see anything that wild at the end of the first movie, there is a question of whether or not Star Trek or Star Wars exists in Marty’s world, as his prank to get young George McFly to ask Lorraine Baines out on a date included this copyright nightmare that almost wasn’t.

<p>                     This has to be one of the <em>best</em> moments in <em>Back to the Future</em> history, and in pop culture cinema in general. With the audience being led to believe that Doc Brown died at the end of <em>Part II</em>, we soon learn that he’s alive and well in 1885! That knowledge is delivered through a fateful Western Union telegram, with Marty’s expression of joy speaking for us all.                   </p>

Doc’s Western Union Telegram Reaches Marty

This has to be one of the best moments in Back to the Future history, and in pop culture cinema in general. With the audience being led to believe that Doc Brown died at the end of Part II , we soon learn that he’s alive and well in 1885! That knowledge is delivered through a fateful Western Union telegram, with Marty’s expression of joy speaking for us all.

<p>                     <em>Back to the Future: Part III</em> has one of those classic moments where it feels like a <a href="https://www.cinemablend.com/news/2552296/how-the-terminators-time-travel-works"><em>Terminator</em>-style Ontological Paradox</a> has shown itself in our timeline. With Marty using a "Frisbie's" pie plate to save Doc’s life, ruining Mad Dog Tannen’s attempt to murder Doctor Brown may be similar to the scenario where Kyle Reese becomes John Connor's father.                    </p>

Marty Saves Doc’s Life While Inventing The Frisbee

Back to the Future: Part III has one of those classic moments where it feels like a Terminator -style Ontological Paradox has shown itself in our timeline. With Marty using a "Frisbie's" pie plate to save Doc’s life, ruining Mad Dog Tannen’s attempt to murder Doctor Brown may be similar to the scenario where Kyle Reese becomes John Connor's father. 

<p>                     Marty McFly’s future speak tends to confuse people in 1955, and Doc Brown is one of the most frequent victims. Throwing down this ‘80s piece of slang, <em>Back to the Future’s</em> hero is trying to say that the situation is serious, close to dire. Whereas Doc, the lovable eccentric that he is, thinks something’s wrong with gravity in 1985.                   </p>

“This is heavy.”

Marty McFly’s future speak tends to confuse people in 1955, and Doc Brown is one of the most frequent victims. Throwing down this ‘80s piece of slang, Back to the Future’s hero is trying to say that the situation is serious, close to dire. Whereas Doc, the lovable eccentric that he is, thinks something’s wrong with gravity in 1985.

<p>                     Making sure you still exist in the grand scheme of things is one of those pitfalls of traveling to the past. And the moment that Marty McFly and his siblings hinge upon is that time where George McFly (Crispin Glover) and Lorraine Baines (Lea Thompson) shared their first kiss at the “Enchantment Under The Sea” dance. Talk about a scene where time actually felt like it stopped, and for a very sweet reason.                   </p>

George And Lorraine’s First Kiss

Making sure you still exist in the grand scheme of things is one of those pitfalls of traveling to the past. And the moment that Marty McFly and his siblings hinge upon is that time where George McFly (Crispin Glover) and Lorraine Baines (Lea Thompson) shared their first kiss at the “Enchantment Under The Sea” dance. Talk about a scene where time actually felt like it stopped, and for a very sweet reason.

<p>                     If you ever need a lesson on why time travel is such a dangerous thing, watch <em>Back to the Future: Part II</em>. Time paradoxes, and alternate timelines, become a matter of importance when Biff Tannen takes over Hill Valley, becoming its big wheel in Tangent 1985. A wasteland where George McFly’s dead and Doc Brown is institutionalized, it’s the last place Marty McFly would ever want to be.                   </p>

Biff Tannen’s Hill Valley

If you ever need a lesson on why time travel is such a dangerous thing, watch Back to the Future: Part II . Time paradoxes, and alternate timelines, become a matter of importance when Biff Tannen takes over Hill Valley, becoming its big wheel in Tangent 1985. A wasteland where George McFly’s dead and Doc Brown is institutionalized, it’s the last place Marty McFly would ever want to be.

<p>                     Doc Brown (Christopher Lloyd) promised the world a future with flying cars at the end of <em>Back to the Future</em>. Unlike reality, the sequel <em>Back to the Future Part II</em> delivered on that promise.                   </p>

“Roads? Where we’re going, we don’t need…roads.”

At the end of Back to the Future , we’re all ready to see Marty and Jennifer (Claudia Wells) settle down for a peaceful weekend at the lake. But then, like a bolt out of time, Doc Brown proclaims that “something’s gotta be done” about their kids. Which leads Doc to drop this all-timer line that set up the future so perfectly.

<p>                     One of the red letter days in history, <a href="https://www.cinemablend.com/news/2551465/how-back-to-the-futures-time-travel-works">how <em>Back to the Future’s </em>time travel works</a> comes from this very moment in the first entry of director Robert Zemeckis’ classic adventure. The Flux Capacitor, the speed needed to conduct time travel, everything you needed to know came from this beautiful, awe-inspiring moment.                   </p>

October 21, 1985: The First Time Travel Experiment

One of the red letter days in history, how Back to the Future’s time travel works comes from this very moment in the first entry of director Robert Zemeckis’ classic adventure. The Flux Capacitor, the speed needed to conduct time travel, everything you needed to know came from this beautiful, awe-inspiring moment.

<p>                     The future of <em>Back to the Future: Part II</em> is clearly an invention of an imagination based in the 1980s. But while the Cubbies did come close to going all the way that year, and we’re not even close to <em>Jaws 19</em>, seeing Marty arrive in 2015 is still a mindblower. If only because it’s fun to compare the present with this vision of the future.                   </p>

Marty’s Arrival In 2015

The future of Back to the Future: Part II is clearly an invention of an imagination based in the 1980s. But while the Cubbies did come close to going all the way that year, and we’re not even close to Jaws 19 , seeing Marty arrive in 2015 is still a mindblower. If only because it’s fun to compare the present with this vision of the future.

<p>                     A lot of cultural touchstones are surprisingly invented throughout the history of <em>Back to the Future</em>. That comes from Marty just acting naturally when put into a scenario like being forced by Buford “Mad Dog” Tannen to dance. And what’s the first dance that comes to mind to a kid from 1985?                    </p>

Mad Dog Buford Tannen Helps Marty Invent The Moonwalk

A lot of cultural touchstones are surprisingly invented throughout the history of Back to the Future . That comes from Marty just acting naturally when put into a scenario like being forced by Buford “Mad Dog” Tannen to dance. And what’s the first dance that comes to mind to a kid from 1985? 

<p>                     <strong>Sold For: </strong>$501,200                   </p>                                      <p>                     Ever since <em>Back to the Future Part II</em> came out, we've been waiting for hoverboards to become real. We're still waiting for that, so we'll have to make do with the props from the film. One of which, sold in 2021 for over a half million dollars. There were two added features that helped boost the sale, it was autographed by stars Michael J. Fox and Tom Wilson.                   </p>

1985 Marty Discovers The Hoverboard

Back to the Future’s story has a lot of callbacks that echo moments from the iconic first film. And in some cases, like when 1985 Marty discovers the Hoverboard in Back to the Future: Part II , those recurring themes amp up those familiar moments. Even old Biff Tannen (Thomas F. Wilson) couldn’t help but feel deja vu when Marty used that toy of the future to evade Griff Tannen’s gang.

<p>                     The opening of 1985’s <em>Back to the Future</em> is a pretty effective montage that sums up Doc’s life pretty nicely. Showcasing many inventions, honors, and even that gigantic amp that Marty McFly (Michael J. Fox) blows out before school, there’s infinite possibilities when it comes to what’s hiding among the “junk.”                    </p>

Doc Brown’s House Of Scientific Junk

The opening of 1985’s Back to the Future is a pretty effective montage that sums up Doc’s life pretty nicely. Showcasing many inventions, honors, and even that gigantic amp that Marty McFly (Michael J. Fox) blows out before school, there’s infinite possibilities when it comes to what’s hiding among the “junk.” 

<p>                     Inventing time travel in <em>Back to the Future</em> could be Christopher Lloyd’s peak of fame, but he also had a successful, Emmy-winning run on <em>Taxi</em> after making his screen debut in <em>One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest</em> in 1975. He played another professor (Plum) in 1985 for <em>Clue</em>, re-teamed with Robert Zemeckis for 1988’s <em>Who Framed Roger Rabbit?</em>, played Uncle Fester in two <em>Addams Family</em> movies, and has reprised “Doc” many times - such as in the <em>Back to the Future</em> animated series and a 2011 Nike ad.                    </p>                                      <p>                     Following his recent turn in <em>Nobody</em> and a stunning live-action <em>Rick and Morty</em> promo, the 83-year-old shows no signs of stopping, with many interesting projects, including playing another time-traveling scientist in <em>Time, the Fourth Dimension</em> and starring in <em>Next Stop Christmas</em> with his <em>Back to the Future</em> co-star, Lea Thompson.                    </p>

“Great scott!”

You can’t talk about Back to the Future without mentioning how Doctor Emmett L. Brown (Christopher Lloyd) uses this catchphrase to show wonder and amazement. Or, in other cases, “Great Scott!” sometimes means something pretty heavy’s gone down. Either way, it’s hard not to think of those words when recalling the man himself.

More for You

Colorado Official Targets Clarence Thomas After Supreme

Colorado Official Targets Clarence Thomas After Supreme Court Loss

Republican presidential candidate former President Donald Trump speaks at a campaign rally Saturday, March 2, 2024, in Richmond, Va. (AP Photo/Steve Helber)

Trump keeps making incendiary statements. His campaign says that won't change.

undefined

Vladimir Putin and China's President Xi Jinping 'on brink of war' as tensions boil

Scott Pelley, Tiffany Justice and Tina Descovich split image

'60 Minutes' host presses Moms for Liberty co-founders in heated interview: 'You're being evasive'

Nebraska’s New Racist “Stand Your Ground” Law Puts Us All in Danger

Nebraska’s New Racist “Stand Your Ground” Law Puts Us All in Danger

Why Kellogg's CEO's 'let them eat flakes' moment hit so hard

Why Kellogg's CEO's 'let them eat flakes' moment hit so hard

Volunteers setup provisions for distribution to migrants

Mass Casualty Incident at US-Mexico Border

News Networks Carry Donald Trump's Supreme Court Remarks - And His Unfounded Claim That Joe Biden Weaponized Justice Department

News Networks Carry Donald Trump's Supreme Court Remarks, And His Unfounded Claim That Joe Biden Weaponized Justice Department

Top Putin Aide Unveils Fantasy Map of New Russian Borders

Top Putin Aide Unveils Fantasy Map of New Russian Borders

Court tosses part of Jan. 6 sentence, could impact 100 defendants' prison time

Court tosses part of Jan. 6 sentence, could impact 100 defendants' prison time

Hamas terrorists Gaza

Moore says White Christians are Jewish people's true enemy: 'No Palestinian ran the Spanish inquisition'

‘A National Security Disaster’: Intel officials sound the alarm of the danger of a second Trump term

‘A National Security Disaster’: Intel officials sound the alarm of the danger of a second Trump term

New Jersey first lady Tammy Murphy poses for pictures with a billboard truck outside the Bergen County Democratic convention in Paramus, New Jersey on Monday.

Tammy Murphy wins in a blowout in crucial Senate Democratic convention in NJ

costco_1_052821

Costco quietly makes a massive food court change

In this image grab from an AFPTV video, a US aircraft carrying food parcels flies above a beach in the Gaza Strip before dropping the humanitarian aid attached to parachutes. (Photo by -/AFP via Getty Images)

Why the US dropped MREs instead of Humanitarian Daily Rations over Gaza

Cannabis has 'deadly' effect on most common form of cancer, study finds

Dozens of photos created with artificial intelligence have been circulating on social media depicting Donald Trump with Black supporters. By: X/@EdKrassen

Deepfakes Exposed: Pics of Trump Posing With Black Supporters Are A.I. Creations

Tribe: SCOTUS C.O. ruling ‘decides more than it needs to,’ leaves the Constitution 'enforceable’

Tribe: SCOTUS C.O. ruling ‘decides more than it needs to,’ leaves the Constitution 'enforceable’

14 Paradoxes That Are Real Head-Scratchers

14 Paradoxes That Are Total Head-Scratchers

jim banks biden SOTU

Republican Makes Demand for Biden's State of the Union Address

  • Skip to main content
  • Keyboard shortcuts for audio player

Leap for joy! The creative ways NPR listeners are marking Feb. 29

Rachel Treisman

journey to the end of night quotes

Nearly 80 "leaplings" of all ages celebrated their leap day birthday on a Caribbean cruise in 2020. Organizers expect a similar turnout this year. Jason Bohn hide caption

Nearly 80 "leaplings" of all ages celebrated their leap day birthday on a Caribbean cruise in 2020. Organizers expect a similar turnout this year.

Thursday is a leap day, the rare date of February 29 that's added to the calendar nearly every four years.

That means the roughly 5 million people worldwide born on that day — aka "leaplings" — will get to celebrate on their actual birthday. Others will spend it commemorating a leap day wedding, engagement or anniversary.

For many, Thursday may just be another day — but one they'd like to use wisely by doing something they love, taking time for themselves or giving back to others. That can take many forms.

Why do we leap day? We remind you (so you can forget for another 4 years)

Strange News

Why do we leap day we remind you (so you can forget for another 4 years).

"Think about that extra that you can give or that extra that you can do, and enjoy that bonus day that we only get once every four years," said Katheryn Jager, of Cedar Park, Texas.

Jager, 50, has big plans for the day: She and her fiancé are "taking the leap," getting married in their backyard surrounded by friends and family on the four-year anniversary of their first date.

How Do You Celebrate A Leap Year Birthday?

How Do You Celebrate A Leap Year Birthday?

She said their first date in 2020 wasn't specifically planned for leap day. It was just the day that the two of them — longtime friends who reunited after being divorced and widowed — happened to be free. The day now carries special significance, not to mention some perks.

"It has been fun to hear how many people have congratulated my fiancé on being so clever as to get an anniversary which only occurs once every four years," Jager said. "He very happily tells them we'll celebrate close to the day."

journey to the end of night quotes

Katheryn Jager and Garrett Smith, pictured inside Honey Creek Cave in Texas in 2023. Jager says the two bonded over their love of outdoor adventures and will go caving immediately after their leap day wedding. Katheryn Jager hide caption

Katheryn Jager and Garrett Smith, pictured inside Honey Creek Cave in Texas in 2023. Jager says the two bonded over their love of outdoor adventures and will go caving immediately after their leap day wedding.

Jager is one of the more than 100 respondents who answered NPR's callout asking how people plan to celebrate leap day this year. Their responses ranged from the elaborate to the everyday.

Several leap day babies and their family members said they'll be celebrating with birthday trips abroad — on a cruise, to a new continent or to a bucket list city. Others said they'll be enjoying leap day birthdays with parties at home, many inspired by the age they'll technically be turning.

"We are hosting an 8 year old party!" wrote Grace Boersma, who will be turning 32 by other calculations. "Going ice skating then heading back to a house for a 'Frozen Food Feast,' as 8-year olds love frozen foods (dino chicken nuggets, cheese sticks, fries, etc.). There is also a cocktail part as well for attendees to come up with a cocktail that an 8-year old would like (if they could drink)."

Several people are honoring late relatives born on the day by making family recipes or doing a good deed. Others are celebrating wedding anniversaries, some for the first time since the COVID-19 pandemic hit in early 2020.

Pop Culture

2024 is a leap year and there's an irish tradition associated with leap day.

Many will try to make the day special for their young children, like the parent who maintains a "leap year fund" to throw her daughter a big celebration every four years, and the family planning a "last first day" party to celebrate the final calendar date their baby has yet to experience.

And lots of people don't have personal ties to the day but still plan to take off work, catch up on chores or use it to enjoy some of their favorite activities, like thrifting, seeing a movie or clocking some extra miles on a run.

"Even the day I gave birth on Leap Day 2016 Facebook asked me 'Did you make the most of your extra day today?' Um, yes Facebook ... I birthed a baby," wrote Stephanie Vazquez. "I would encourage everyone to use that extra day for yourself somehow."

In case you need some inspiration, NPR's Morning Edition spoke to nearly a dozen people around the U.S. about how they're making the most out of leap day.

How to celebrate a leap year birthday

journey to the end of night quotes

On the 2020 leap day cruise, people celebrated their birthday with a ball on board. Jason Bohn said many of them have kept in touch since. Jason Bohn hide caption

On the 2020 leap day cruise, people celebrated their birthday with a ball on board. Jason Bohn said many of them have kept in touch since.

Many people born on Feb. 29 told NPR that they have strong feelings about which day to celebrate in non-leap years.

Many prefer Feb. 28, reasoning that they were born on the last day of the month. Some go with March 1, since they were born the day after Feb. 28. Others claim both days, or they switch, depending on the year.

Jason Bohn, who is turning 11 (or 44) on Thursday, says that he's in the minority who celebrates on March 1 — and that it's a topic of heavy debate in the leap year community. He's especially plugged in, as a member of the leap day baby group on Facebook and one of the organizers behind the second consecutive leap day cruise.

Bohn was one of nearly 80 leaplings who took a four-day cruise to the Bahamas in 2020. Attendees ranged in age from 1 year old to their upper 70s, and they represented more than 30 states and 10 countries. They celebrated the actual leap day itself at sea with a leap day ball, swapping baby photos and getting to know each other.

People who were born on Feb. 29 often feel left out. Not this year, it's leap year

"When we kind of came together, it was just like we were already family," Bohn said. "We got back home, and two weeks later the world shut down. And it was really comforting to have that group of people that we had met on the cruise. It was almost kind of a second family for a lot of us, and we've stayed in touch throughout the years."

Bohn says about a dozen of the original cruisers will be back this time around, joined by some 60 newcomers. He estimates that all told, leaplings and their families will make up some 250 passengers — "a little bit of a force on that ship."

The West Allis, Wis., resident is excited to get some sun and celebrate with other leaplings. He has helped plan activities — and matching lanyards — to help the group bond. Those include pre-cruise drinks in Miami and another Feb. 29 ball, which he described as the true highlight last time.

"It was just great to just have that time to kind of really focus on ourselves and the thing that makes us all a little more special than most," he added.

Other leap day babies celebrating on land told NPR that they will be spending time with their families, eating at their favorite restaurants, partying with friends and stocking up on freebies from businesses that do leap day giveaways with proof of a Feb. 29 birthday (or at least they did in 2020 ).

A great day to mark an anniversary or even get (re)married

journey to the end of night quotes

Chris Goonan and his wife, Caroline, returned to the Florida beach where they got married on leap day 2020 — this time with their 1-year-old son. Christopher Goonan hide caption

Chris Goonan and his wife, Caroline, returned to the Florida beach where they got married on leap day 2020 — this time with their 1-year-old son.

Several respondents said they'll be celebrating a wedding anniversary on Feb. 29, with a few even planning to get married — or remarried — on the day itself.

Chris Goonan, 33, says he and his wife, Caroline, will be celebrating their "first real wedding anniversary" since they got married in 2020.

They had a destination wedding at Gilbert's Bar House of Refuge, a historic site near Stuart, Fla., where Goonan had been stationed with the Coast Guard. They booked it because of the venue's availability, not the date itself.

"We knew that we wanted to do it in February because all of our family would be coming down from upstate New York," he explained. "And we saw that February 29th was available. It was a Saturday. We didn't even consider that it was a leap year, and we were like, 'Absolutely, we have to do it.'"

This year, the couple plans to travel from their home in Syracuse back to the same beach and eat at the restaurant that catered their wedding. And Goonan says it will be even more special this time, since they are bringing their 1-year-old son with them.

"This will be his first time down to Florida to see the ocean and actually touch the ocean," he said, adding they plan to repeat the tradition every leap year going forward.

Cindy and PJ Gaynard will be celebrating their fifth anniversary, 20 years after they got married.

Wed as teens, they renew vows 71 years later — and share secrets to everlasting love

Goats and Soda

Wed as teens, they renew vows 71 years later — and share secrets to everlasting love.

They specifically wanted to get engaged and married on leap day, in part to buck the pressure they felt to celebrate every single anniversary of the day they met. They couldn't even remember the date, but they say it was July and not February.

"We're like, 'That's a lot of pressure.' So we were just like, 'Well, let's just do it every four years, and every four years we'll celebrate our anniversary really big,'" said Cindy.

They do so by holding vow renewal ceremonies every four years, or as they call it, "getting married again." The Gaynards, who now have two children, have picked a wide variety of themes and asked different friends to officiate each one.

journey to the end of night quotes

Cindy and PJ Gaynard renew their vows every four years to celebrate their leap day wedding anniversary. Previous venues have included a planetarium, beach, Las Vegas chapel and roller-skating rink. PJ and Cindy Gaynard hide caption

They first got married at a planetarium, underneath star charts representing their connecting trajectories. Their second "wedding" was officiated in Las Vegas close to midnight by an Elvis impersonator, whom they recall being visibly drained from doing weddings all day. The next leap year, they ate cupcakes on a beach in Malibu, Calif., near where they lived at the time.

Then the couple moved to Pittsburgh and celebrated their next anniversary "getting married" at a roller-skating rink while strapped into roller blades. Four years ago, after a snowstorm canceled their travel plans, they threw together a clown-themed wedding at a local "vegan restaurant-slash-vintage shop."

This year, they're hosting a screening of one of Cindy's favorite movies, Pretty in Pink , at PJ's film studio — with a surprise twist.

Cindy says she, like many people, has always hated the ending of the movie, in which Andie (Molly Ringwald) chooses rich-kid Blane (Andrew McCarthy) over lovable Duckie (Jon Cryer) at prom. It was actually shot the other way around at first, says PJ.

"We're going to stop the movie early, do the ending the way that was originally in the script and then get married as Andie and Duckie," he added.

There are plenty of other ways to make the day special

journey to the end of night quotes

Rachel Nantt is throwing a 2020-themed party on leap day, and plans to dress up in the graduation cap and gown she didn't get to wear (or return) during the pandemic. Rachel Nantt hide caption

Rachel Nantt is throwing a 2020-themed party on leap day, and plans to dress up in the graduation cap and gown she didn't get to wear (or return) during the pandemic.

Even if you're not celebrating a birthday or anniversary, or rewriting cinema history, there are still things you can do to make your bonus day a little extra special.

That could mean getting more done, from chores to socializing to sleeping in.

One respondent told NPR they're thankful for an extra day to pack up their apartment before their lease ends on March 1. Another says her family always goes out to eat at IHOP, citing her dad's love of puns.

It could also mean doing nothing at all.

"Why not make it a self-care, indulge care, hobby day," wrote Emeka Barclay. "For me, that feels like a day of no social media, no newsfeeds, no politics... I just know that whatever I do, it will be a free day for me."

Others are hosting parties to celebrate the day itself, like graduate student Jillian Winter. She said things can feel bleak and overwhelming, both for those finishing their PhDs and anyone following the news cycle, and she is eager to spread some good cheer.

"Obviously, there will be party games that involve leaping ... Candy will be tossed at people ... There will be a 'shrimp tree,' aka I'll decorate my ficus tree with shrimp ornaments (which will double as party favors)," she wrote. "Folks will share Leap Day secrets and offer up toasts for the bonus day ... Never forget, 'Real life is for March !'"

Unique ways Americans celebrate the holidays, from skiing Santas to Festivus feats

Unique ways Americans celebrate the holidays, from skiing Santas to Festivus feats

For Rachel Nantt and her friends, it will be a day of nostalgia, reflection, and sweatpants. The Fargo, N.D., resident is throwing a party with a 2020 theme — the updated version of the 2016-themed bash she attended four years ago.

The 27-year-old will don the college graduation gown she didn't get to wear during her COVID graduation. The group will play Among Us , the online game that kept many people connected during the early months of the pandemic.

Nantt says she has fielded plenty of jokes about the theme, including attendees saying they should dress up as someone who just got laid off. But she says it's uplifting to think about how far she and her friends have come since that difficult time.

"I feel like I've kind of taken life more by the horns and done what I wanted," she said, pointing to her career transition and new relationship. "And when I was 23, four years ago, I can't say that I was doing that. So I look back and I think, how amazing that I can just be happy and be truly who I am to this day."

And Nantt hopes others can find joy in the day too, even if it's just another Thursday.

  • anniversaries
  • celebrations

Phillies are replacing Dollar Dog Nights after 27 seasons with a buy-one, get-one promotion

The Phillies say “last year was the tipping point” to change their popular promotion after crowds threw hot dogs and clogged concourses waiting in line.

The Phillie Phanatic shoots hot dogs to fans during a break while Phillies played the San Francisco Giants in 2022.

The dollar-dog days are over.

The Phillies are retiring Dollar Dog Night after 27 years and replacing the popular promotion with two games in April when fans will be able to buy two hot dogs for the price of one. The team said it eliminated Dollar Dog Night after raucous crowds last season began to throw hot dogs and lines at concession stands clogged the concourses.

“Look, we’re very proud of this promotion,” said John Weber, the Phillies senior vice president of ticket operations and projects. “It’s been talked about. It’s been great for 27 years. But it was just time for a change. We’ve been discussing a change for the last couple years. The unfortunate incidents last year of the throwing of the hot dogs plus the feedback from our fans postgame survey, the fans told us that it was time for a change.”

» READ MORE: Phillies Dollar Dog Nights: The good, the bad, and the ‘Pukemon’

The first “Hatfield Phillies Franks BOGO Night” is scheduled for Tuesday, April 2 against Cincinnati with a second night on Tuesday, April 16 against Colorado. A hot dog costs $5 at Citizens Bank Park and fans will be permitted to buy two dogs (but receive four) per transaction. The Phils held three Dollar Dog Nights last season and imposed a similar four-dog limit per transaction.

“Last year was kind of the tipping point. People were throwing hot dogs,” Weber said. “We still want to provide an opportunity for a discounted concession item. Two hot dogs for $5 and still come out to the game.”

A game last April against Seattle was briefly delayed in the ninth inning while a Phillies’ ball girl collected hot dogs that been thrown onto the field. It was a “waste of a good hot dog,” John Kruk deadpanned on the broadcast. Fans had been tossing hot dogs in the seating bowl throughout the game.

“The fan experience was just not what we want it to be,” Weber said. “Our goal as an organization is to always provide a first-class fan experience to all of our fans. We didn’t meet those goals for those three Dollar Dog Days, for sure. We set out to come up with a solution and hopefully this works for everyone.”

The Phillies introduced Dollar Dogs in 1997 as a way to drum up sales at Veterans Stadium for a team that lost 94 games. As other promotions came and went, the discount dogs returned every season. The Phillies became known for Dollar Dog Nights. They even offered Dollar Dogs during the 257-game sellout streak that started in 2009. The promotion had limited dates in recent seasons but remained popular among fans. The Phils averaged 43,437 fans at last season’s Dollar Dog Nights, each of which was an early-season weeknight game against a non-marquee opponent.

“We can’t have people throwing things,” Weber said. “We want our fans to come and enjoy the games. You don’t see people throwing hot dogs in regular situations. It’s still a discounted program. It’s been 27 years and it’s all about making sure the fan experience is a good one and an enjoyable one.”

Weber said the Phillies will increase staffing and security at this season’s discount-dog nights, hoping to alleviate the long lines at concession stands and calm fans if they become unruly.

“I don’t think anyone who was here for those three games will tell you that it was as enjoyable as it normally is,” he said. “ … You want to engage your younger fan group, especially on those April and May dates where families may not be coming out as much. We hope this does it, while also people won’t have extra hot dogs laying around or people won’t just buy them and start throwing them.”

» READ MORE: The ultimate guide to the 2024 Phillies Theme Nights at Citizens Bank Park

IMAGES

  1. Steve Almond Quote: “At the end of night, before you close your eyes

    journey to the end of night quotes

  2. Louis Ferdinand Celine

    journey to the end of night quotes

  3. Goodreads

    journey to the end of night quotes

  4. Steve Almond Quote: “At the end of night, before you close your eyes

    journey to the end of night quotes

  5. At the end of the night...

    journey to the end of night quotes

  6. 44 Inspiring Good Night Quotes (with Calming Images)

    journey to the end of night quotes

COMMENTS

  1. Journey to the End of the Night Quotes

    Journey to the End of the Night Quotes. "The sadness of the world has different ways of getting to people, but it seems to succeed almost every time.". "An unfamiliar city is a fine thing. That's the time and place when you can suppose that all the people you meet are nice. It's dream time.

  2. Louis-Ferdinand Céline Quotes (Author of Journey to the End of the Night)

    The living people we've lost in the crypts of time sleep so soundly side by side with the dead that the same darkness envelops them all. As we grow older, we no longer know whom to awaken, the living or the dead.". ― Louis-Ferdinand Celine, Journey to the End of the Night. tags: 145 , memory , past. 89 likes.

  3. 30 Best Journey To The End Of The Night Quotes With Image

    Journey to the End of the Night, written by Louis-Ferdinand Céline, is a groundbreaking and highly influential novel that explores the dark underbelly of human existence. Published in 1932, it remains one of the most significant works of 20th-century literature, praised for its unique narrative style, its raw depiction of human suffering, and ...

  4. Quotes from Journey to the End of the Night

    Come, kiss me.". ― Louis-Ferdinand Céline, quote from Journey to the End of the Night. "In the kitchens of love, after all, vice is like the pepper in a good sauce; it brings out the flavor, it's indispensable.". ― Louis-Ferdinand Céline, quote from Journey to the End of the Night. "We've no use for intellectuals in this outfit.

  5. Journey to the End of the Night Quotes

    To invoke one's posterity is to make a speech to maggots. Louis-Ferdinand Céline. The whole business of your life overwhelms you when you live alone. One's stupefied by it. To get rid of it you try to daub some of it off on to people who come to see you, and they hate that. To be alone trains one for death.

  6. Journey to the End of the Night

    Journey to the End of the Night (French: Voyage au bout de la nuit, 1932) is the first novel by Louis-Ferdinand Céline.This semi-autobiographical work follows the adventures of Ferdinand Bardamu in World War I, colonial Africa, the United States and the poor suburbs of Paris where he works as a doctor.. The novel won the Prix Renaudot in 1932 but divided critics due to the author's ...

  7. Journey to the End of the Night

    Louis-Ferdinand Céline, pen name of Dr. Louis-Ferdinand Destouches, is best known for his works Voyage au bout de la nuit (Journey to the End of the Night), and Mort à crédit (Death on the Installment Plan).His highly innovative writing style using Parisian vernacular, vulgarities, and intentionally peppering ellipses throughout the text was used to evoke the cadence of speech.

  8. Analysis of Louis-Ferdinand Céline's Journey to the End of the Night

    The 1932 publication of the cynical and darkly comic Journey to the End of the Night by Louis-Ferdinand Céline (1894-1961) sent immediate shock waves into a French literary world still reeling from the social and artistic disruptions of World War I. Its audacious literary use of spoken French—a colloquial Parisian slang, itself vulgar, funny, street-smart,…

  9. Journey to the End of the Night Quotes

    Journey to the End of the Night Quotes. Louis-Ferdinand Céline. This Study Guide consists of approximately 60 pages of chapter summaries, quotes, character analysis, themes, and more - everything you need to sharpen your knowledge of Journey to the End of the Night.

  10. Louis-Ferdinand Céline

    Contents. 1 Quotes. 1.1 Voyage au bout de la nuit (Journey to the End of the Night, 1932) 1.2 Mea culpa; suivi de la vie et l'oeuvre de Semmelweis (1937) 1.3 L'Ecole des cadavres (The School for Corpses, 1938) 1.4 Les Beaux Draps (A Fine Mess, 1941) 2 About Louis-Ferdinand Céline. 3 References.

  11. Journey to the End of the Night Analysis

    Speaks of Journey to the End of the Night as concerning not only death but also survival. Cite this page as follows: "Journey to the End of the Night - Bibliography" Great Characters in Literature ...

  12. Journey to the End of The Night by Louis-Ferdinand Céline

    Journey to the End of The Night by Louis-Ferdinand Céline. Journey to the End of The Night. by. Louis-Ferdinand Céline. The novel is a semi-autobiographical work that explores the harsh realities of life through the cynical and disillusioned eyes of the protagonist. The narrative follows his experiences from the trenches of World War I ...

  13. Journey to the End of the Night Summary

    Summary. Ferdinand, an indifferent student of medicine in Paris, is anarchistic in his reaction to authority and emphatically pacifistic. Immediately prior to World War I, he is expounding his ...

  14. Journey to the End of the Night

    "Journey to the end of the night is a novel in the first person, and in what a first person: that of Bardamu, the most blackly humorous and disenchanted voice in all of French literature. And the hardest to resist; for this is a novel to do with persuasion, written in an aggressive yet insidiously rhythmic spoken French, able both to scandalise ...

  15. Journey to the End of the Night Summary

    Plot Summary. Journey to the End of the Night is a modernist novel by Louis-Ferdinand Celine, first published in the French language in 1932 by Parisian publishing house Éditions Denoël et Steele. It is a semi-autobiographical work centered on the life and travels of cynical antihero Ferdinand Bardamu, set over several decades of Bardamu's ...

  16. Céline's journey to the cutting edge of literature

    Journey to the End of Night is Céline's first novel. Published in 1932, it made him an instant literary star. With typical immodesty, Céline felt he was robbed of the Prix Goncourt (won by the ...

  17. Journey to the End of the Night

    Journey to the End of the Night. Louis-Ferdinand Céline. Calder, 1988 - Fiction - 448 pages. When it was published in 1932, this revolutionary first fiction redefined the art of the novel with its black humor, its nihilism, and its irreverent, explosive writing style, and made Louis-Ferdinand Celine one of France's--and literature's--most ...

  18. Journey To The End Of The Night Quotes (12 quotes)

    Quotes tagged as "journey-to-the-end-of-the-night" Showing 1-12 of 12. "Study changes a man, puts pride into him. You need it to get to the bottom of life. Without it you just skim the surface. You think you're in the know, but trifles throw you off. You dream too much.

  19. Journey to the End of the Night

    Céline's masterpiece—colloquial, polemic, hyper-realistic, boiling over with black humor. Céline's masterpiece—colloquial, polemic, hyper realistic—boils over with bitter humor and revulsion at society's idiocy and hypocrisy: Journey to the End of the Night is a literary symphony of cruelty and violence that hurtles through the improbable travels of the petit bourgeois (and ...

  20. Journey to the End of the Night Characters

    Léon Robinson. Léon Robinson (lay- OH [N] ), his friend, an unscrupulous cynic who turns up, like a personal demon, everywhere Ferdinand goes. The planner of the bombing of old Madame Henrouille ...

  21. Journey to the End of the Night

    Céline's masterpiece―colloquial, polemic, hyper-realistic, boiling over with black humor. Céline's masterpiece―colloquial, polemic, hyper realistic―boils over with bitter humor and revulsion at society's idiocy and hypocrisy: Journey to the End of the Night is a literary symphony of cruelty and violence that hurtles through the improbable travels of the petit bourgeois (and ...

  22. Louis-Ferdinand Céline, Journey to the end of the night

    Louis-Ferdinand Céline, Journey to the end of the night by John Sturrock. Publication date 1990 Topics Céline, Louis-Ferdinand, 1894-1961. Publisher Cambridge University Press Collection inlibrary; printdisabled; internetarchivebooks Contributor Internet Archive Language English. Access-restricted-item true Addeddate 2013-12-10 16:40:16.377372

  23. TOP 21 END OF JOURNEY QUOTES

    Ralph Waldo Emerson. Journey, Steps, Ends. 8 Copy quote. Show source. Never make your home in a place. Make a home for yourself inside your own head. You'll find what you need to furnish it - memory, friends you can trust, love of learning, and other such things. That way it will go with you wherever you journey.

  24. Most Important Arya Stark Episodes In Game Of Thrones

    The Hound and Arya were never destined to stick together forever, and by the end of Season 4, their journey was at an end. After running into Brienne of Tarth, the Hound was left at death's door.

  25. 30 Back To The Future Trilogy Quotes And Scenes That Stand The ...

    Well buckle up, as we're about to hit 88 miles per hour, celebrating the many memorable quotes and moments that stand the test of time. Universal "I'm afraid you're just too darn loud."

  26. Leap year 2024: How to make the most of your extra day : NPR

    Thursday is a leap day, the rare date of February 29 that's added to the calendar nearly every four years. That means the roughly 5 million people worldwide born on that day — aka "leaplings ...

  27. Phillies replace Dollar Dog Nights with a buy-one, get-one promotion

    The first "Hatfield Phillies Franks BOGO Night" is scheduled for Tuesday, April 2 against Cincinnati with a second night on Tuesday, April 16 against Colorado. A hot dog costs $5 at Citizens Bank Park and fans will be permitted to buy two dogs (but receive four) per transaction. The Phils held three Dollar Dog Nights last season and imposed ...