There is a new English translation called Death on Credit.
Previous translations were called, Death on the Installment Plan.
Was able to track down link to the original French, can download from Archive, in several formats.
AI on Celine
Death on the Installment Plan (original French: Mort à crédit) is a 1936 novel by Louis-Ferdinand Céline, widely considered a landmark of modern literature and a precursor to black humor.
It serves as a prequel to his earlier work, Journey to the End of the Night, and is generally regarded as his second most significant novel.
The narrative follows Ferdinand Bardamu, Céline’s alter ego, as he reflects on his traumatic boyhood and adolescence in the slums of early 20th-century Paris.
The story depicts a grim upbringing marked by familial dysfunction, poverty, and abuse, particularly from his father, an ineffectual insurance clerk. Ferdinand’s journey includes failed jobs, a brief and nightmarish stint at an English boarding school, and a complex relationship with the eccentric inventor Courtial des Pereires.
Céline revolutionized the novel form through his telegraphic and elliptical style, utilizing Parisian slang and vulgarity to convey the urgency and intensity of his characters’ emotions.
Although initially controversial for its bleak depiction of lower-class life and obscenity, the book has since been recognized for its innovative prose and profound influence on writers such as Jack Kerouac, Henry Miller, and William Burroughs.
