Successful books
The Prodigious Friend (ed. Gallimard, 2014): Elena Ferrante’s tetralogy traces the friendship of Elena and Raffaela, from their childhood in the 1950s in a poor neighborhood of Naples, until 2003. Huge popular success, this work has was adapted for television in 2018.
Meet in Positano (ed. Le Tripode, 2017): written in 1984 by Goliarda Sapienza, to whom we also owe The Art of Joybut only published in 2015 in Italy and two years later in France, this novel is a dazzling and intense tribute to Erica, a friend met in Positano, a famous village on the Amalfi Coast.
A life like any other (ed. Buchet-Chastel, 2018): this very long novel about the fate of four university friends led to its author, Hanya Yanagihara, being selected for the prestigious Booker Prize in 2015, the year of its publication in English .
Conversations between friends is the first novel by Irish author Sally Rooney, released in 2017, and two years later in French. It follows two college friends who find themselves under the influence of a couple of artists. The book was adapted for the small screen in 2022. Sally Rooney’s follow-up novel, Normal People, published in 2018, traces the story of love and friendship of two young Irish people who meet in high school. It also received enthusiastic critical acclaim, was shortlisted for the Booker Prize and adapted into a miniseries.
One Piece, by Eiichiro Oda, is the best-selling manga of the 21ste century. Its publication began in 1997. We discover the notion of nakama (“colleague”, “friend”, “compatriot”), not always understood by Westerners.
This concept, which conveys the idea of mutual aid, is central in this manga where the main character teams up with nine other pirates to discover treasure.
My friends (2024) is the latest novel by Hisham Matar, an English-speaking Libyan writer. He tells the story of friendship struck by shocks in the story of three Libyans in exile, from the United Kingdom to the United States.
Unmissable series
The classics
Impossible not to refer to Kind regards, with Roger Moore and Tony Curtis (1971-1972), the fine team of old ladies of the Golden Girls (The Craquantes1985-1992), to Seinfeld (1989-1998), to the New Yorkers of Sex in the City (1998-2004), and to students of Community (2009-2015). But it’s the series Friends, broadcast from 1994 to 2004, which undoubtedly left its mark the most.
Criticized for its lack of realism and the prejudices it conveyed, it is nevertheless an essential reference in popular culture, both for millennials and for younger people, who discovered it particularly at the time of the death of actor Matthew Perry, in October 2023.
The most recent
In the sitcom Big Bang Theory (2007-2019), the awkwardness of four scientist and geek friends, Leonard, Sheldon, Howard and Rajesh, contrasts with the candor of their neighbor, Penny, waitress and aspiring actress.
Girls (2012-2017) is part of the continuity of Sex and the City and, like its predecessor, describes the lives of young New Yorkers. But its bias is much more realistic, notably by showing bodies that do not conform to thinness standards.
Broad City (2014-2019) also takes place in New York and focuses on the professional and emotional struggles of two twenty-somethings, Ilana and Abbi.
The L Word Q Generation (2019-2023) takes over from The L Wordbroadcast between 2004 and 2009, series dedicated to a group of lesbian, bisexual and trans friends and which became a symbol of LGBT+ visibility on screen.
Unlike many series which feature young people, Grace and Frankie (2015-2022) presents the surprising shared accommodation of two septuagenarians who seem to be completely opposed.
Big Little Lies (2017-2019), with Nicole Kidman, Reese Witherspoon and Meryl Streep, depicts the stifling yet seemingly perfect daily life of forty-something middle-class women in a small American town. A darker and more cynical version than Desperate Housewives. A third season is in preparation.
Currently broadcast
Four More Shots, Please! is the Indian equivalent of Sex and the City and makes us discover the life and torments of the golden youth of Bombay.
Platonic, with Rose Byrne and Seth Rogen, evokes the subject of friendly breakups through the reunion of several childhood friends.
In our archives
Find here other suggestions for works on friendship that we identified three years ago.
In 2021, we already dedicated an issue to the joys and importance of friendship. With some stories to reread today on our site, including “Friendship: the family meal where everything changed”, the story of Guy and Hussein, who were separated by everything, from their social class to their ethnic origin through their political opinions, until the chance of life brings them together at a dinner. The beginning of a common adventure, told the Sunday edition of Telegraph.
Also to be found in our archives, the long investigation by the German weekly Die Zeit, who was already wondering: “Why are our friends our friends?” And this very beautiful story published in The Observer, “What Alberto, 92, taught me about loneliness”, the story of a friendly relationship at the start of the first confinement, in London, between a young woman and an isolated retiree. Unknown element
