Lust for Life

A story of excruciating power.The New York Times

The classic, bestselling biographical novel of Vincent Van Gogh

Since its initial publication in 1934, Irving Stones Lust for Life has been a critical success, a multimillion-copy bestseller, and the basis for an Academy Award-winning movie.

The most famous of all of Stones novels, it is the story of Vincent Van Goghbrilliant painter, passionate lover, and alleged madman. Here is his tempestuous story: his dramatic life, his fevered loves for both the highest-born women and the lowest prostitutes, and his paintingsfor which he was damned before being proclaimed a genius. The novel takes us from his desperate days in a coal mine in southern Belgium to his dazzling years in the south of France, where he knew the most brilliant artists (and the most depraved whores). Finally, it shows us Van Gogh driven mad, tragic, and triumphant at once. No other novel of a great mans life has so fascinated the American public for generations.