Darker than "On the other castle," although we feel in "North" in early novel, heavy atmosphere, gray, cold Berlin in ruins, destroyed by bombs. It feels really spent 50 pages to be in this city, amid the rubble, in a thick gray where the sirens resound amid the pink and yellow lights that project here and there the flames; Berlin, decor where no longer hold as facades, or a few pieces of torn buildings; where the streets no longer exist, where we no longer crosses that people at large, ragged or poor marking to clear a bit and bring in own lot which was destroyed. And further, when Celine, Lili, La Vigue and Bebert reach Zornhof, there really is observed and saw how a small hamlet in the middle of which are maintained vis-à-vis each other hatreds between resistant, prisoners, refugees, collaborators, anti or pro-Nazi, anti-French, anti-German, Russian ... the tension is permanent, suspicion reigns, paranoia is rampant, leading to exhaustion, madness, to questions incessant, to distrust ... and then hunger! it is who eats the most and best, who best cope to survive and find food amid hatreds and resentments. There are also moments of sharing, certainly a little forced, just to avoid conflicts, denunciations, but still, these moments of Grace, indulgence, generosity, which keep a little order and dignity. And when the end is near and that everything collapses, the man also never ceases to hope or to act as if nothing had happened, as if everything would work out ... "North" is really a novel of the Apocalypse, bristling with powerful thoughts and nightmarish visions. Céline still less feverish and on edge in the first works. This is the old doctor, tired, discreet and dedicated which is in the foreground.
