num_pages: 80
description: 
  Downstream, the shortest and most autobiographical of Huysmans’ novels, is the perfect example of what the French naturalists wanted a novel to be. This dark and mordantly comic masterpiece of everyday pessimism about a Parisian clerk seeking spiritual contentment is the perfect introduction to the pleasures of Joris Karl Huysmans (1848–1907), whose exquisite style is ironically the most perfect remedy for any reader’s taedium vitae.

language: English
title: Downstream
titlecomplete: Downstream
genres: Literature, Classics, Novels, 19th Century, France, French Literature, Fiction
ratings_count: 284
publisher: Turtle Point Press