French · Intermediate
Read La Guerre du feu in Frenchwith every sentence explained
English title: Quest for Fire
J.-H. Rosny aîné · 1911
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About the book
La Guerre du feu by J.-H. Rosny aîné was first published in 1911. In Passage you read the full text in the original French, marked intermediate and filed under fantasy, science fiction and young adult. It runs to about 55,600 words.
The fire has gone out. Without it, the tribe will die.
A hundred thousand years ago, the Oulhamr flee into the night after an enemy attack, and in the chaos their precious fire is lost. No one in the tribe knows how to make it again. Without fire there is no warmth, no light and no protection against the beasts of the darkness.
The chief, Faouhm, promises his niece, the lovely Gammla, to whoever brings the fire back. Young Naoh, strong and cunning, sets out with two companions, Nam and Gaw, across a savage world of mammoths, cave lions, giant bears and hostile tribes, while the brutal Aghoo brothers race to beat him to the prize.
J.-H. Rosny aîné's prehistoric epic is pure adventure, raw and thrilling. It inspired Jean-Jacques Annaud's acclaimed 1981 film Quest for Fire.
- Author
- J.-H. Rosny aîné
- First published
- 1911
- Language
- French
- Level
- Intermediate
- Genre
- Fantasy, Science Fiction, Young Adult
- Length
- About 55,600 words
How it opens
Les Oulhamr fuyaient dans la nuit épouvantable. Fous de souffrance et de fatigue, tout leur semblait vain devant la calamité suprême: le Feu était mort. Ils l'élevaient dans trois cages, depuis l'origine de la horde; quatre femmes et deux guerriers le nourrissaient nuit et jour.
Reading La Guerre du feu in Passage
Passage sets the book as a quiet, paginated reader in French. Read at your own pace, and when a sentence stops you, tap it. You get:
- a natural translation of that exact sentence,
- a short note on the grammar, in plain words,
- the key words, which you can save with the sentence they came from,
- all of it in English, Spanish, French, German, Italian, Turkish or Portuguese, whichever you read best.
It's marked intermediate: comfortable once everyday French feels familiar, with the harder sentences one tap away. The words you save come back later in short review games, so the book keeps teaching after you close it.
