He was a controversial figure and became famous with his first novel Voyage au bout de la nuit (1932, Journey to the End of the Night). Céline was wounded severely in World War I and respected as a national hero. After World War II he was accused of collaborating with the Nazis and only his literary fame saved him from imprisonment.
In 1936 he wrote Mort a credit, or Death on the Installment Plan (English translation, (1938) that was considered innovative, chaotic, and antiheroic visions of human suffering.
Pessimism pervades Céline's fiction as his characters sense failure, anxiety, nihilism, and inertia. Céline was unable to communicate with others, and during his life sank more deeply into a hate-filled world of madness and rage.
A progressive disintegration of personality is visible in the stylistic incoherence of his books based on his life during the war: Guignol's Band (1944; English translation, 1954), Castle to Castle (1957; English translation, 1968), and North (1960; English translation, 1972).
His novels are verbal frescoes peopled with horrendous giants, paraplegics, and gnomes, and are filled with scenes of dismemberment and murder. Some readers also find them very funny, which infuriated Celine.
Accused of collaboration, Céline fled (1944) France to live in Germany at Sigmaringen and then moved (1945) to Denmark. Condemned by default (1950) in France to one year of imprisonment and declared a national disgrace. Céline returned to France after his pardon in 1951.
Céline's reputation as a writer has been shadowed by his anti-Semitism and reactionary anti-Communism, although his importance as an innovative author has been recognized.