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In Search of Lost Time (À la recherche du temps perdu #1-7)

by Marcel Proust, C.K. Scott Moncrieff (Translator), Andreas Mayor (Translator), Terence Kilmartin (Translator), D.J. Enright (Revisions), Richard Howard (Introduction by)

4.34 of 5 stars 4.34 · rating details · 3,493 ratings · 228 reviews

For this complete, authoritative English-language edition, D. J. Enright has revised the late Terence Kilmartin's acclaimed reworking of C. K. Scott Moncrieff's translation to take into account the new definitive French editions of 'À la recherche du temps perdu' (the final volume of these new editions was published by the Bibliothèque de la Pléiade in 1989).

Boxed Set, 4211 pages

Published June 3rd 2003 by Modern Library (first published 1913)

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Mar 28, 2013 Manny rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: french, parody-homage, too-sexy-for-maiden-aunts, transcendent-experiences, life-is-proust, pooh-dante

When you read Proust, and learn to appreciate his extraordinary, dreamy, hypnotic, truly inimitable style (this review is a mere shadow on the wall of a Platonic cave), which succeeds in making the syntax of language, usually as invisible as air, into a tangible element, so that, like literary yogis, we may feel, for the first time, how enjoyable the simple activity of reading, like breathing, can be; and discover the delights of sentences which took the author days to construct and us an hour t...more

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Jul 31, 2009 Jessica rated it 5 of 5 stars Recommends it for: recherchers of temps perdu; rememberers of things past; snobs; size queens

Shelves: favorites, groups-of-people, hagging-out, happyendings, leetle-boys, love-and-other-indoor-sports, must-reread, wish-i-owned

I took today off work because I need to put everything I own into boxes so I can move tomorrow, but obviously I can't begin doing that until I get some of these obsessive thoughts about Proust out of my system. I mean, can I? Nope. I can't! After all, this house is where I read Proust -- wait, I read Swann's Way before I moved here, which is pretty nuts to think about -- and so how can I move without reviewing the whole thing?

I do feel pretty traumatized after finishing this book. Sort of shells...more I took today off work because I need to put everything I own into boxes so I can move tomorrow, but obviously I can't begin doing that until I get some of these obsessive thoughts about Proust out of my system. I mean, can I? Nope. I can't! After all, this house is where I read Proust -- wait, I read Swann's Way before I moved here, which is pretty nuts to think about -- and so how can I move without reviewing the whole thing?

I do feel pretty traumatized after finishing this book. Sort of shellshocked and confused with all these half-formed thoughts and intense inexplicable feelings bouncing around in me, and I don't know what to do with them or myself. Yesterday I wound up sitting in my friend's bar explaining Proust's aesthetic theories, but that kind of behavior'll get you kicked out of most places, and is not really becoming a young lady. And obviously that's where this website comes in.... what is it for, if not to unload just this kind of mental baggage?

Reading Proust made me wish I were more of a scholar, so I could try to puzzle out some kind of literary context for what this book is. I feel like people think of Proust as being stuffy and old-fashioned and all crusty and ancient, but I think a lot of that has to do with the subject matter (a lost time with superficial resemblance to Jane Austen's milieu), so it's kind of shocking to remember what else was going on while he was writing this. I know this is dumb and there're much better comparisons, but I kept thinking while reading this that it was like thinking your whole life that New York punk in the seventies was all about the Ramones and imagining you really got what was going on then from just listening to that.... but then when you're in your mid-twenties someone suddenly plays you Television for the first time, and you're like what? Like you think you know what modernism is, it's like Ulysses or whatever, but then you find out it's got this completely insane cousin across the river who's just doing all these things that appear at first to have no relationship at all to everything you ignorantly thought you kind of understood at least a little bit before. Again, I'm not much of a scholar and what I'm saying probably doesn't make any sense. To be honest, I don't even know what "modernism" means, I just know it sounds literary.... I think what I'm trying to get at is that the relevance of Proust's concerns to his time aren't immediately obvious because his approach to them initially seems so weird and unfamiliar. But then you realize, while you're in it, that Proust is actually so much of his time it's incredible, and that what he's saying and doing was hugely innovative and exciting at the beginning of the last century, and actually, I'd say, remains as much so today. And I just kind of wish that I knew more about art and literature and whatnot so I could tie it all in better, since I sense there're all these fascinating connections and reference points, but I don't know what they are. I'd sort of like to sneak into some college class or something where they're reading Proust, and listen in, or at least steal their syllabus.... do they even read Proust in college? I feel like they don't. I mean, I never heard of him when I was in college, or after. I really hadn't. I honestly had no idea who Proust was until I started hanging out on this website.

Anyway, for me the most relevant contemporary writer I thought of while reading this wasn't a novelist. A little background: I always really loathed the discipline of psychology and thought it was stupid. When I unwittingly enrolled in social work school, I was dismayed to discover that getting my MSW involved reading pages and pages of precisely this stuff I'd always looked down on.... My happy discovery was that Freud, at least, was actually a fabulous writer, and a lot of his ideas are totally fascinating and very beautiful. What I realized finally is that I just resented psychology for its pretension of pretending it's a science. But actually psychology's concerns and sometimes even their expression are hugely significant -- among the most significant -- and kind of wonderful. In fact, I decided, I love psychology, as long as it knows its place and realizes it's an art, not a science.... Freud said he wanted his case histories to read like short stories, so I think he understood this. Proust, of course, took this to an extreme, by exploring essentially the same territory, not in a short story, but in an extraordinarily long and in some ways kind of ridiculous novel. In Search of Lost Time is about the development of the mind, the experience of consciousness, the influence of past events and relationships on one's emotions and behavior.... all the same stuff Freud cared about, only it made more sense to me here, presented this way.

I completely lost my shit reading the last couple pages of this book, and broke down on some fundamental level in a way I imagine was akin to what you can get from really top-shelf psychotherapy. Towards the end of the book, Proust explains everything he's been trying to do, and just did, in writing this novel. It's his theory of art and specifically of literature, and it's pretty hard to argue with since you've watched him just do it. One of the things that Proust says is that readers of his book "would not be my readers but readers of themselves, my book serving merely as a sort of magnifying glass, such as the optician of Combray used to offer to a customer, so that through my book I would give them the means of reading in their own selves" (p. 384). I guess that could sound unexciting, ripped out of context, but he really does do this, and it truly is astounding. I felt throughly convinced by Proust's theory of what art is for, and as far as I'm concerned he was totally successful in accomplishing his aims. Like psychotherapy, ISoLT attempts to dive into the murk of the unconscious past to retrieve experiences and cognitions that have become inaccessible. Proust dives in and swims down to the bottom, and he finds them, and he grabs them, and he brings them back up and then hands them to you.... Which is pretty nuts. I mean, it's intense. I feel fucked up from it.

Hm. I thought I wanted to talk about this book, but maybe I just want to pack up my shit after all. I really do want to review this book, but maybe it's too soon? It's a really insane novel, and there's tons of stuff in it I'd really love to dork out about on here.... but yeah, maybe too soon. I might come back and say something more coherent later on, when it's all settled down a bit.

I guess the only thing I need to add right at this moment is that I really felt like Proust gave me this particular combination of the things I need most. I really can't read anything too difficult or serious, and to anyone who's considering giving Proust a try -- I can't emphasize this enough -- forget what you heard: this book is anything but a ponderous drag. It's silly and hilarious and smart and bizarre, and there's tons of fashion and sex and depravity and satire and insane plot twists that don't make any sense. I personally have a very short attention span and I cannot and do not read anything that isn't vastly entertaining. In Search of Lost Time is VASTLY ENTERTAINING!! (Except for The Captive, which is only somewhat entertaining.) This is not to say that it's for everyone, and I can see how lots of people would totally hate this. HOWEVER: it's definitely worth a shot, because this book could change your life. I mean that. It could. I'm a completely different person now than I was when I started. So what if this means I'm now an obsessively jealous, elitist, antisemitic, agoraphobic pervert who speaks exclusively in run-on sentences? I think I'm better for it, and you might be too.(less)

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Robin Wow, I go away for a week....

I don't mean to sound like some sort of elitist (and a nerd for going back to the original subject, much as I love the B...more
Aug 08, 2009 07:48pm

Jen Robin wrote: "Wow, I go away for a week....

I don't mean to sound like some sort of elitist (and a nerd for going back to the original subject, much a...more
Aug 10, 2009 12:41pm

Mar 13, 2013 Manny rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: french, too-sexy-for-maiden-aunts, life-is-proust, celebrity-death-match

Celebrity Death Match Special: In Search of Lost Time versus Harry Potter

The francophone world was stunned by today's release of papers, sealed by Proust for 100 years after publication of the initial volume of his famous series, which finally reveal his original draft manuscripts. In the rest of this review, you can find out what Proust's books looked like before his well-meaning but unworldly editor decided that French literateurs would prefer something slightly different.

(view spoiler)...more Celebrity Death Match Special: In Search of Lost Time versus Harry Potter

The francophone world was stunned by today's release of papers, sealed by Proust for 100 years after publication of the initial volume of his famous series, which finally reveal his original draft manuscripts. In the rest of this review, you can find out what Proust's books looked like before his well-meaning but unworldly editor decided that French literateurs would prefer something slightly different.

(view spoiler)(less)

21 likes · like · see review

Jan 06, 2013 Jason is currently reading it · review of another edition

Shelves: à-la-recherche-du-temps-perdu, for-kindle, reviewed

Initially published in French between 1913 and 1927, Marcel Proust’s seven-part work In Search of Lost Time (also called Remembrance of Things Past) has undergone a befuddling series of translations. The “Moncrieff–Kilmartin–Enright” version, made available for this Modern Library publication, is essentially the original C. K. Scott Moncrieff translation with further revisions by Terence Kilmartin in 1984 (based on the 1954 definitive French text) and D. J. Enright in 1992.

As I finish each volum...more

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Nov 06, 2009 Jimmy rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: fiction

Andre Gide, who worked for the famous Gallimard press in the early 20th century, rejected Proust's manuscript for Swann's Way, which was the first installment of the epic Remembrance of Things Past. I often wonder whether or not he ever regretted this decision, but, then again, Gide had his reasons. As an avowed homosexual, he reproached Proust for the repressed homosexuality that was an obvious reality of the work. In example, the girl Albertine, who young Marcel pines for in the early stages o...more Andre Gide, who worked for the famous Gallimard press in the early 20th century, rejected Proust's manuscript for Swann's Way, which was the first installment of the epic Remembrance of Things Past. I often wonder whether or not he ever regretted this decision, but, then again, Gide had his reasons. As an avowed homosexual, he reproached Proust for the repressed homosexuality that was an obvious reality of the work. In example, the girl Albertine, who young Marcel pines for in the early stages of the work, was in actuality, Albert, based on one of Proust's lovers. Gide's criticisms weren't terribly inappropriate though. Through reading Proust's biography, one gets the impression that he was a shameless hypocrite. Then again, this also brings to light the question of whether Proust was less of a novelist than he was a philosopher/cultural critic/journalist/etc. It's funny because at one point in the work he references the literary critic Saint Beauve, who had a theory that the reader should be aware of every tiny detail of the writer's life in order to fully grasp the essence of their work. Remembrance is full of little tidbits like these; he also mentions the German literary critic August Wolf, who was famous for his theory that Homer was actually a sort of pseudonym for the various authors that had worked on the Odyssey and the Iliad.

Honestly, Proust is an overwhelming subject in the space of a review. Piles of books have been written on the man, as well as his works, so I'm not even going to attempt any of that. What I will do is offer my opinion of his work.

First of all, it's insane how what is Proustian plays into this analysis. In itself, my memory of Proust's work can be adequately evoked by a series of sensations that remind me of his work. For Proust, a lime tea soaked madeliene cookie (or tea cake) sparks the memory of an entire life time. This is essentially what is Proustian; any one of our given senses is capable of evoking a broad expanse of psychological memory. So when I am driving through, say, the desert in Southern Nevada, in the springtime, I am instantly reminded of the two or three months that I spent reading Proust. Of course, this is also clearly just another mysterious psychological quirk inherent in human memory, but it still stands as the inspiration for Proust's passionate reflections.

The eponymous character of Swann's Way is an exemplification of the Belle Epoque renaissance man. This is Proust's idol in the early chapters of his masterpiece, a person who is aware of cultural fashions, yet at the same time displays a sense of weariness about how this particular brand of social prestige can actually benefit people. Proust was notorious for his scathing parodies of the characters that frequented the salons of his cultural reality. In other words, Proust enjoyed poking fun at his contemporaries. After three thousand pages of eloquent prose (Allain de Botton once pointed out the fact the the longest sentence contained within Remembrance of Things Past can actually be wrapped around an entire wine bottle (he shows a typographical example of this by presenting the sentence in a circular form, literally)) I am at a loss in attempting to point out the more significant parts of the work, but I do remember bits and pieces.

Much of the scenes are contained within the confined space of the literary salons of Paris. These people discuss painting, classical music, literature, philosophy, the theater, etc. It's akin to Dickens in the way that Proust portrays each character. They are all presented as hyperbolic parodies of themselves. The Dreyfus affair acts as a political centerpiece for Proust's opinions; he once referred to himself as the most stalwart Dreyfusard (which is incorrect because the novelist Emile Zola was far more dedicated that he was, essentially facing exile for his fervent views on the subject, and the author who penned a letter of complaint to the president of France at the time).

Proust goes on (and on) like this throughout the entirety of the work. It's the story of a neurotic consumptive who aspired to become a great writer (I have nothing but faith in the fact that he accomplished this). It's a story of heartbreak, disappointment, lost love, and failed relationships. It's an historically contained account of the intellectual milieau of late 19th century Paris. It is, in general, a sweeping autobiography written by one of the most curious characters that the entire canon of western literature has ever had to offer. In short, it's life as told through the lens of a effete, bourgeois, dandyish genius.

The end is of course the most profound point in the story, as well as the most melancholy. At one of the very last social gatherings Marcel attends he can't help but notice how terribly everyone has aged. Oddly enough, it just now seems more apparent than ever. Proust muses on how literature has the profound ability to freeze moments of history in time. This rings true for him because he is the perfect example of what Freud would refer to as a man who replaced love and sex with research. Also, he is the perfect example of what Modernism would later become obsessed with, which is time, and the inherent difficulties that its philosophical significance carries. Given his fragile, physical state of being, it seems all too appropriate that his life goal was to offer us this intellectual insight into one of the richest moments of European history, that is, as opposed to actually living it.

"The idea of Time was of value to me for yet another reason: it was a spur, it told me that it was time to begin if I wished to attain to what I had sometimes perceived in the course of my life, in brief lightning-flashes, on the Guermantes way and in my drives in the carriage of Mme de Villeparisis, at those moments of perception which had made me think that life was worth living. How much more worth living did it appear to me now, now that I seemed to see that this life that at every moment we distort can be restored to its true pristine shape, that a life, in short, can be realised within the confines of a book!"(less)

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May 10, 2013 Mari Mann rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

There are some writers that have made such a unique contribution to literature and to art that they are considered among the best, if not the best, and not just in their own country, but in the world. Such a writer was Marcel Proust. He has been called the greatest novelist of the 20th century, and the novel, A la Recherche du Temps Perdu, compared to Michelangelo’s Sistine Chapel ceiling. But Michelangelo was known as “The Divine”, while Proust was called a hypochondriac, a dilettante, a homose...more There are some writers that have made such a unique contribution to literature and to art that they are considered among the best, if not the best, and not just in their own country, but in the world. Such a writer was Marcel Proust. He has been called the greatest novelist of the 20th century, and the novel, A la Recherche du Temps Perdu, compared to Michelangelo’s Sistine Chapel ceiling. But Michelangelo was known as “The Divine”, while Proust was called a hypochondriac, a dilettante, a homosexual and a mama’s boy. All of these things were true, to a certain extent, and when the first volume of In Search of Lost Time (Swann’s Way) was published in 1913, Proust’s friends were shocked that he had produced such a masterpiece. As Marcel himself said, there was not just one Proust, but many, and his many selves were often paradoxical and antithetical to each other. He used the ways of a hypochondriac to make people, mostly his mother, give him special treatment, yet he had his first asthma attack at age nine and struggled with ill health until his death at age 51. He was a social-climbing dilettante yet spent the last ten years of his life as a virtual recluse, shielded from the outside world by the cork-lined walls of his bedroom. He was a homosexual who wrote and spoke as if he deplored homosexuality. And he was a mama’s boy who used the love and anguish of that relationship as a springboard for the novel’s deep and enduring truths about all forms of love and devotion and life and art.

But do we really need to know anything about the writer to understand, or even appreciate, the work itself? Remembrance of Things Past, or as it is more accurately titled now, In Search of Lost Time, is often described as a semi-autobiographical work, so can’t we just read the books to know the man? No, in answer to both questions, but…yes. Although Proust only peripherally identifies the “Narrator” in Lost Time as himself, the book closely parallels his life, possibly a better phrase would be reflects his life (as some key things are reversed, as if seen in a mirror). And at the risk of sounding dramatic, Proust gave this life- mentally & physically- to the service of writing these volumes. He gave the novel his life and in return, it gave him immortality. Proust was aware of this “bargain with the devil” he’d made, and when he wrote fin at the end of the novel, he told his housekeeper/companion “Now I can die”…and shortly afterward, he did. Knowing something of the life of this man can help illuminate the world of Lost Time, as a reading of Lost Time illuminates not just Marcel’s life but all lives, our own included. That’s one of the reasons why this work is regarded as one of the world’s best, and why it is as relevant to us now as it was then and as it will continue to be in the future

In Search of Lost Time actually consists of seven volumes, the first being Swann’s Way. When these volumes were being translated into English, the translator changed the title, A la recherché du Temps Perdu, to a line from Shakespeare, “Remembrance of Things Past”. This is not only a bad interpretation of In Search of Lost Time , it’s not even what the novel is about. Marcel hated it. He didn’t much care for Swann’s Way either, which in French is Du cote de chez Swann, but what could he do? He was only the author.

So what is the novel about? And if it’s so great, why do so many people start reading it but give up before they even reach the famous madeleine scene? Is it because of Proust’s famously long sentences (the Proust Society of America says his longest is 958 words & may be the longest sentence in all of literature)? Or because, as one critic complained after the publication of Swann’s Way, that Proust takes fifteen pages to tell how he turns over in bed at night? Yes. But when the long sentences and the seemingly random and rambling passages begin to coalesce into a whole, and the invisible web of past, present and future becomes visible and clear, then the magnitude of this work and the joy of reading it shines through.

But what is it about? It's about life, from one life to all lives.(less)

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Sep 11, 2012 Sandra rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: favorites

11/2/2010 Oggi ho terminato di leggere "Dalla parte di Swann".
"Ma quando di un antico passato non sussiste niente, dopo la morte degli esseri, dopo la distruzione delle cose, soli, più fragili ma più intensi, più immateriali, più persistenti, più fedeli, l'odore e il sapore restano ancora a lungo, come anime, a ricordare, ad attendere, a sperare, sulla rovina di tutto il resto, a reggere, senza piegarsi, sulla loro gocciolina quasi impalpabile, l'immenso edificio del ricordo".
Il ricordo rimane v...more 11/2/2010 Oggi ho terminato di leggere "Dalla parte di Swann".
"Ma quando di un antico passato non sussiste niente, dopo la morte degli esseri, dopo la distruzione delle cose, soli, più fragili ma più intensi, più immateriali, più persistenti, più fedeli, l'odore e il sapore restano ancora a lungo, come anime, a ricordare, ad attendere, a sperare, sulla rovina di tutto il resto, a reggere, senza piegarsi, sulla loro gocciolina quasi impalpabile, l'immenso edificio del ricordo".
Il ricordo rimane vivo e sconfigge anche la morte.
9/7/2010 Oggi ho terminato la lettura di “all’ombra delle fanciulle in fiore”.
“E il timore di un avvenire in cui saremo privati della vista e della compagnia di coloro che amiamo e dai quali ci viene oggi la gioia più cara, si accresce se pensiamo che al dolore di una simile privazione si aggiungerà non sentirla come dolore, restarvi indifferente..; sarebbe dunque una vera morte di noi stessi, morte seguita da resurrezione, ma di un io diverso, all’amore del quale non possono giungere le parti dell’antico io condannato a morire. Sono queste che provano sgomento e oppongono un rifiuto, con ribellioni in cui si deve vedere un modo segreto, parziale, tangibile, reale della resistenza alla morte, della lunga, disperata e quotidiana resistenza alla morte frammentaria e continua che si insedia in noi per tutta la durata della nostra vita…”
li 11/10/2010 ho terminato di leggere "i Guermantes".
"Un uomo, che sia diventato sordo del tutto, non può nemmeno far scaldare accanto a sè un bollitore pieno di latte senza dover spiare con gli occhi nel recipiente scoperchiato il riflesso bianco, iperboreo, simile a quello di una tempesta di neve, che è il segno premonitore al quale sarà bene ubbidire togliendo, come il Signore arresta le onde, la spina elettrica, infatti quella specie di uovo ascendente e convulso del latte che bolle sta salendo, sollevandosi irregolarmente, gonfia, arrotonda qualche vela semicapovolta che la panna aveva increspato e ne lancia nella tempesta una di madreperla che l'interruzione di corrente, se l'uragano elettrico è scongiurato in tempo, farà girare su se stessa e getterà alla deriva mutata in petali di magnolia."
Anche l'attività quotidiana più semplice come il bollire il latte è poesia nella penna di Proust.
13/1/2011: ho terminato la lettura di Sodoma e Gomorra.
" In qualsiasi momento la consideriamo, la nostra anima nella sua totalità ha un valore quasi soltanto fittizio, nonstante il cospicuo bilancio delle sue ricchezze, poichè ora le une ora le altre sono indisponibili, sia che si tratti di ricchezze effettive o immaginarie, e nel mio caso, per esempio, quella dell'antico nome di Guermantes o quelle, tanto più gravi, del vero ricordo della nonna. Perchè ai turbamenti della memoria sono legate le intermittenze del cuore. E' probabile sia l'esistenza del nostro corpo, simile per noi a un vaso in cui sarebbe rinchiusa la nostra spiritualità, a farci supporre che tutti i nostri beni interiori, le nostre gioie passate, tutti i nostri dolori siano perennemente in nostro possesso. Forse è altrettanto inesatto credere che essi svaniscano o ritornino. In tutti i casi, se restano in noi, la maggior parte del tempo risiedono in una zona sconosciuta dove non ci sono di alcuna utilità, e dove anche i più usuali sono soffocati dai ricordi di altro ordine e che escludono ogni simultaneità con essi nella nostra coscienza. Ma se riusciamo a riafferrare l'insieme di sensazioni in cui sono custoditi, essi hanno, a loro volta, il medesimo potere di espellere tutto ciò che è incompatibile con essi, di installare in noi soltanto l'io che li ha vissuti".
19/3/2011: ho terminato la lettura de "la prigioniera". Per me credo sia il volume della Recherche che più mi ha affascinato.
"Ciò che ci lega alle persone sono le mille radici, quei fili innumerevoli che sono i ricordi della serata di ieri, le speranze del mattino di domani, quella trama continua di abitudini da cui non riusciamo a liberarci. Così come esistono avari che accumulano per generosità, noi siamo dei prodighi che scialano per avarizia, e sacrifichiamo la nostra vita non tanto a un essere quanto a tutto ciò che egli ha saputo legare a sè delle nostre ore, dei nostri giorni, delle cose al cui confronto la vita ancora da vivere, la vita relativamente futura, ci sembra più remota, più distaccata, meno intima, meno nostra."
17/5/2011: ho terminato di leggere "la fuggitiva".
"Ogni donna sente che, più il suo potere su un uomo è grande, il solo modo di andarsene è fuggire.Fuggitiva perchè regina.E' così.Certo, esiste una distanza immensa tra la noia che solo un istante prima essa ci ispirava e quel furioso bisogno di averla presso di sè per il fatto che se ne è andata."
"La vera vita, la vita finalmente scoperta e messa in luce, di conseguenza la sola vita realmente vissuta, è la letteratura, vita che, in un certo senso, dimora in ogni momento in tutti gli uomini così come nell'artista. Ma essi non la vedono perchè non cercano di portarla alla luce".
Il mio viaggio con Proust è terminato. Cinque stelle non rappresentano il valore di quest'opera monumentale, le ho messe simbolicamente: le mie stelle sono dieci, cento, mille... (less)

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Sep 18, 2011 Hayes marked it as celebrity-death-match · review of another edition

Review for Celebrity Death Match Only

In this corner Monty Python for Marcel Proust...

...And in this corner Stick Figure Hamlet.

Monty Python are very strong this evening, and start out brilliantly, throwing several very good punches. Hamlet doesn't seem in very good shape, and is moving sluggishly. But NO! Proust burns out; Monty Python cant keep up the momentum; they try to come back with a pathetically inadequate ending, but slow and steady, Hamlet knocks out the competitor.

Title goes to Hamle...more

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Sep 10, 2008 Mitchel rated it 5 of 5 stars Recommends it for: anyone who can appreciate it

Shelves: best-of-the-best

Every page of this book is packed with gorgeous, poetic writing and jaw-dropping, often hilarious psychological observation. Proust does not prop himself up with over-complex structures, is not confusing, is not gratuitously strange. He understood life preternaturally well and wrote about it preternaturally well. This is the novel of all novels. But read cautiously: Proust will dissect your most intimate thoughts and motivations, and he will be as accurate as a sniper.

"All our final decisions a...more

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Jan 30, 2010 Brent Hayward rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

The year of reading Proust. Amen. This was monumental, a life event, like having a child or losing a friend or seeing a wonder of the world. Proust himself, I imagine, must have been rather annoying, but this subtle and (of course) incredibly long rail was unforgettable.

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Jun 17, 2007 Malini Sridharan rated it 4 of 5 stars Recommends it for: people with a lot of time to kill or who need a reason to be pretentious

This book is good reading if you have huge chunks of captive free time (like my 50 minute train commute).If you cannot dedicate at least 1.5 hrs a day, 4-5 days a week to reading, it is probably not worth starting. At that pace, I finished the novel in about 4 months with a week break between each volume and a few days of desperate magazine huffing in the middle of Guermantes Way.

I read half in the modern library classics edition and half in the newer penguin translation. I had an easier time w...more

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Jan 20, 2013 Hossain Salahuddin rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: philosophical-fiction

“Let us be grateful to the people who make us happy; they are the charming gardeners who make our souls blossom.”

French novelist Marcel Proust (1871-1922) is probably the greatest and most influential novelist of last 100 years in any language. Proust spent the last 14 years of his life, lying on a narrow bed, writing an unusually long novel titled 'À la recherché du temps perdu' or 'In search of lost time'. Since the publication of the first of the 7 volumes in 1913, 'In search of lost time' ha...more “Let us be grateful to the people who make us happy; they are the charming gardeners who make our souls blossom.”

French novelist Marcel Proust (1871-1922) is probably the greatest and most influential novelist of last 100 years in any language. Proust spent the last 14 years of his life, lying on a narrow bed, writing an unusually long novel titled 'À la recherché du temps perdu' or 'In search of lost time'. Since the publication of the first of the 7 volumes in 1913, 'In search of lost time' has been hailed as a masterpiece, and is consistently chosen by the critics and the public as the greatest novel of the twentieth century.

'In search of lost time' (also known by the previous title 'Remembrance of things past') contains over three thousand pages, a million and a half words, and more than four hundred individual characters. It is the longest novel in world literature and undoubtedly a daunting task to begin. However, as the reader gets drawn into it, the daunting bit finally comes to an end. One needs to be aware that, in order to enjoy Proust’s work in full, the more one knows about his life is the better. This is the case with all writers to some extent, but with Proust it is so to an unparalleled degree. In search of lost time is all about the narrator’s past, the experience he has had, often in the minutest detail; the many people he has known, their characters, appearance and habits. In an almost autobiographical way, the life of the narrator of the novel almost mirrors that of Marcel Proust.

Proust’s biographers have a great time identifying the models for his characters amongst the people who knew him. Despite this autobiographical overtone, none of the characters are modelled on any one person. For example, the beautiful Albertine, whom the narrator loves, grew out of the many girls Proust knew and loved in his early years in Paris. They are an amalgam of several people, several physical traits, personal characteristics and situations, and it is this reworking of memory that is the subject of the novel 'In Search of lost time'. To some extent, all writers recaptured memory before Proust, and all writers have certainly done it since, however, no one has done it with such charm, wit, intelligence and perception, and no writer has produced work which had such profound effect upon his readers.

In writing 'In search of lost time', what interested Proust was the human relationships in real life situations. His privileged birth and his connections led him into the society of the rich and idle, what was considered by some to be the top of french society. The imaginary world Proust created from this unique experience is the centrepiece of 'In Search of lost time'. In addition, Proust effortlessly incorporated many radical and world-shattering ideas into his novel. There are many distinct philosophical themes throughout 'In Search of lost time', however, two of the major recurring themes are time and involuntary memory. The taste of a madeleine dipped in tea makes the narrator to recall his childhood visit to Combray, a fictional country town. In this novel, Proust shows us that although time conquers everything, time also can be defeated through art and thus past can be recaptured and relived.

In this monumental novel Proust also points out the causes behind the loss of time and encourages his readers to stop wasting time and begin appreciating their lives. In Proust’s view, human beings, most of the time, walk past fascinating kinds of experiences without really looking at them, studying them - and that’s what Proust wants his readers to do. He wants his readers to take their time to appreciate how rich and interesting the world is. The advantage of taking Proust’s suggestion of not going too fast is that the world suddenly becomes more interesting in the process.

Proust’s last years were so plagued by bouts of asthma and his determination to finish what he has began, that it would seem to most people, that this hermit, who slept by day and worked at night, led a dismal existence. His walls were lined with cork to keep out the noise of the day time world. He could hardly go out without getting attacks of breathlessness. His friends could only see him if they met on unsociable midnight hours. He never found anyone to love or be loved by on a stable basis.

However, his work was his life, through it Proust lived, and that the world is a richer and more humane place because of his remarkable work 'In search of lost time', is without doubt. Anyone who reads this towering work of literature will never be quite the same again. A peculiar warmth and humour pervades this vast novel. Proust asks so many philosophical questions, examines so many corners of human lives and mercilessly uncovers hypocrisy and evil, as well as charm and intelligence, but he does so with wit and sensitivity, and above all generosity of spirit. After putting down 'In search of lost time', readers would know that Marcel Proust’s life was as rich and full as any life can be and the world literature is the better for it.

Proust, Marcel. In search of lost time, New York : Everyman's Library, 2001.(less)

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Dec 16, 2009 Abi rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition Recommends it for: The dedicated and patient literature fan with a good deal of spare time.

Recommended to Abi by: Timothy Baycroft

Shelves: 20th-century, france, favourites

I read this because of Timothy Baycroft. I took his module on the Third Republic in France, HST234, in the first semester of my second year. I asked his advice on what novel to read to gain a better understanding of the period. À La Recherche Du Temps Perdu was his recommendation. And so it began. I later asked him how long it had taken him to read it, and it turns out he never has. I felt slightly conned, but this is now outweighed by gratitude because I never would have read Proust without his...more I read this because of Timothy Baycroft. I took his module on the Third Republic in France, HST234, in the first semester of my second year. I asked his advice on what novel to read to gain a better understanding of the period. À La Recherche Du Temps Perdu was his recommendation. And so it began. I later asked him how long it had taken him to read it, and it turns out he never has. I felt slightly conned, but this is now outweighed by gratitude because I never would have read Proust without his suggestion, and few other books have been so rewarding. So thanks, Tim.
À La Recherche Du Temps Perdu is truly staggering, and not only because it is very possibly the longest novel in print. I read it in English, the C. K. Scott Moncrieff version (with Stephen Hudson for Time Regained - poor Scotty died before he could finish). I read it somewhat sporadically. It was never the only novel I had on the go. Basically, it entails one man's musings and philsophising on... well, pretty much everything, but especially jealous & unrequited love (Proust is BIG on this), homosexuality, The Dreyfus Affair, the value of literature and art, subjectivity and time. It is also a vicious satire of high society in fin de siècle France. It is incredibly funny (whether you're laughing at the narrator or with him), the characters are intricately and intimately drawn, the prose is a complex work of beauty and, contrary to popular belief, the plot's not bad either. I'm maybe alone here, but I think that The Guermantes Way was my favourite, maybe joint with Cities of the Plain, just because I loved the in depth focus on Proust's society and the Dreyfus Affair references. Ah, but in retrospect I loved all the volumes. Even though it was often tough going at the time, it's looking back on Proust that makes you realise how wonderful it is. Which is quite a Proustian way of thinking about it, I suppose. The amazing thing is that the novel actually replicates the feeling of time passing. When you are reintroduced to characters from previous volumes it requires an act of memory to place them. When the narrator reminisces, you reminisce with him because it genuinely has been a long time. It's a most curious sensation, and not one I've got from any other novel.
I won't lie, and there's no getting away from it. Reading Proust occasionally felt like a chore rather than a pleasure. There were times when he'd muse for pages on topics that bored me. There were times when the narrator was entirely repellent. There were times when I wanted to shout at and/or smack him. But there were frequent and redeeming bursts of beauty that swept away the frustration and drudgery and quite literally filled me with wonder.
It was like climbing a very steep mountain; the view was breath-taking but I was often distracted by the difficulty of the journey. What I had forgotten, of course, was how utterly amazing it feels to stand on top of a mountain. When you reach the final volume, and Proust brings together all the subtle strands that he's been developing for two and a half thousand pages, the cumulative effect is of overwhelming, dazzling genius. Sitting in a coffee shop, six months after starting, I was moved to tears by the sheer intellectual force of Time Regained, and a novel that can do that is something special. And you know it's all been worth it, even though the final victory came far too late to be of any help in HST234.
Plus, on a more egotistical note, to be able to say you've read À La Recherche Du Temps Perdu in its entirity makes you feel very clever. Impress your friends and family: pick up Proust today.(less)

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Dec 10, 2012 Ben rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: favorites, world-library-100

Why did Proust have to write a 4000 page novel, especially when there is not any discernable, coherent plot? Was it really necessary to have those extended society scenes, some of which lasted for 150 pages or so? Couldn’t the whole thing have been tightened up a little and cut down to 1000 pages or so?

I asked myself these questions at various points over the nine months it took me to journey through Proust’s masterpiece. It was not until the final two volumes (and particularly the latter half...more Why did Proust have to write a 4000 page novel, especially when there is not any discernable, coherent plot? Was it really necessary to have those extended society scenes, some of which lasted for 150 pages or so? Couldn’t the whole thing have been tightened up a little and cut down to 1000 pages or so?

I asked myself these questions at various points over the nine months it took me to journey through Proust’s masterpiece. It was not until the final two volumes (and particularly the latter half of Time Regained) that it all started to make sense. The point Proust is trying to make can only be experienced (as opposed to realized intellectually) if you have plodded through the seemingly endless series of anecdotes, asides and philosophical musings.

Proust is trying to tell us how the experiences of our past slip away from our memory and, as such, no longer have any obvious impact on us. In some cases, such as in the cases of sexual jealousy and grief, this is a good thing, lest the pain of these losses would forever burden us. But it also isolates us from those moments of pleasure, of experiencing pure beauty. We can try, through the vehicle of voluntary memory to retrieve “the good old days” but we will get nothing more than a snapshot, and will not feel the experience of what it was really like in those moments. The only way to recapture lost time, Proust tells us, is through the involuntary memories that spontaneously arise from random sensory input (the taste of a madeleine soaked in tea, the experience of standing on uneven paving stones, the clang of a spoon against a dish) as it triggers the memories of the last time we experienced the same sensations along with the other physical and emotional sensations with which the catalytic sensation is associated. The experience of these sensations is actually of a purer form than we experienced when they happened to us the first time, because they are not impeded by all the other competing stimuli that were impinging on us at the time. At the time, for example, we may have been disappointed that this resort was not exactly what we had in mind, we may have been worried about the health of a loved one, we might be distracted by concerns of our professional careers. In this moment of recapturing the past, all that comes to us is the unadulterated form of the experience of pleasure.

Of course, this is a pretty unreliable mechanism to tap into our past and, as Proust learns, it is fleeting as well. The only way to recapture the past in a lasting way is through the creation of a work of art: which is where the book comes in. How does a writer depict an experience which is eventually forgotten, and is then perfectly recaptured years later? Well, you have to help the reader have the experience of long stretches of time, of the entirety of a long life lived, complete with all the hundreds of people and experiences and moments of inspiration and self-doubt that come with it. When, in the last pages of Time Regained, Proust describes the incident of the “good night kiss” (one of the earliest episodes of the book), I felt like this did occur 40 years ago, given how long ago I read it. And, as Proust, through his magnificent prose lovingly reconstructed the scene, it came back to me with the full force of his original description. He had succeeded in helping me recapture this literary event, and how beautiful the experience of it was!

I certainly don’t want to try to compete with the length of In Search of Lost Time itself with this review, so let me conclude quickly. Please, if you have any interest at all in serious literature, do not be thrown off by the length of this book. It is an unparalleled work of genius for which, as I hope I have argued successfully above, the length is an essential element. If you make the commitment, you will be rewarded.
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Jun 18, 2012 Rosalba rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Meraviglioso. Non è un tomo, non è l’Everest da scalare, è un viaggio nella memoria, una rievocazione del passato, un percorso fatto di sensazioni e emozioni, il viaggio della vita, da assaporare con la lentezza che lo caratterizza. Non manca nulla in questo capolavoro, tutti i sentimenti sono rappresentati e perciò il lettore non può non ritrovarsi e non condividere le molteplici riflessioni di Marcel Proust sull’infanzia, sull’amore, l’amicizia, l’arte, la letteratura. Unico inconveniente è st...more

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Jan 29, 2013 Leonard rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: literature-french

More than a commentary on Swann’s jealousy or M. Charlus’s homosexuality or the frivolity of the Guermantes’ sorties, Marcel Proust’s monumental work In Search of Lost Time paints the unsuccessful reconstruction of a forgone world and a lost existence from fickle memories, which like morning mists would fade with the rising sun. The narrator Marcel, longing for a past that didn’t exist but must be created, sought to experience Bergson’s continuous time rather than the fragmented and still-framed...more More than a commentary on Swann’s jealousy or M. Charlus’s homosexuality or the frivolity of the Guermantes’ sorties, Marcel Proust’s monumental work In Search of Lost Time paints the unsuccessful reconstruction of a forgone world and a lost existence from fickle memories, which like morning mists would fade with the rising sun. The narrator Marcel, longing for a past that didn’t exist but must be created, sought to experience Bergson’s continuous time rather than the fragmented and still-framed instantaneous moments by attempting to blur the boundaries between Cambray and Paris, childhood and adolescence, and Swann and himself and integrate here and there, before and after, and him and me through memory fragments of previous objects, people and sensations. As in a neural network or a mind-map, the madeleine linked his aunt to his mother, who in turn was linked to Albertine through jealousy, which also connected Marcel with Saint Loop and Swann, who, as with his (Marcel’s) grandmother, linked his childhood and adolescence. And through recollection, Marcel would try to relive the buried years and resurrect his grandmother and Albertine.

But even during his narrative, Marcel realized memory’s willfulness and the variation in hues, shapes, pitch and timbre between the actual object and its mental reconstruction. When he encountered an old friend, the facial features were so different from his recollection and reconstruction, for better or for worse pregnant with all the emotions, preoccupation, biases, that he could not match face with voice.

Because recollected sensation can never equate with the actual experience and time, like a patient thief, steals memories a morsel at a time until one day the owner would realize he was ruined, Marcel ultimately would fail to recapture and assemble stolen sensations and decayed seconds and in the end, must create new moments, new sensations and ultimately a new biography, through the synergy between past experiences and creative imagination. From those deceased hours and decayed memories sprouted In Search of Lost Time, not only Proust’s novel but also that of the narrator.

Whether we savor Marcel’s frailness, Swann’s infatuation, Charlus’s pompousness, Franscoise’s independent-mindedness, the sorties’ frivolousness or the social revelation of the Dreyfuss Affair, we can enjoy Proust’s classic without resorting to Marxist or Freudian or Feminist critique. And the sentences, like the serpentine Amazon, seemed to flow unceasingly into the distant horizon carrying with it the sparkling sunlight. Although ascending the novel’s three thousand pages appears precipitous, the effort will be well worth the while and, at the end of the adventure, the reader can rest on the crisp apex and savor time’s transience and memory’s playfulness as if they were alpine zephyrs. (less)

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Jun 21, 2010 Kyle Pennekamp rated it 5 of 5 stars

For years, my writing partner Scott would use Proust's characters as touchstones and examples while we wrote. I would use Dickens characters. That's the kind of jackasses we are. But then he read some Dickens, and I thought I, in turn, should read some Proust. Around that time, he'd given Ginny a copy of Swann's Way. I also heard that not only did Proust inspire Truffaut's Antoine Doinel series, but when Truffaut found out his cancer was terminal, he spent a great deal of the last three months o...more

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Mar 01, 2010 Ella rated it 4 of 5 stars

Let me clarify: The Proust part gets a full hearty five stars. My voice teacher turned me on to Proust when I was 17. I wish I could thank her on a daily basis. You can't really go wrong with the actual text if you can read French. I cannot without a hefty dose of help and pain from various sources, and it becomes an impossible task without a large table. So I am sticking to the available English translations...

The translations are what hold me back. There is a better translation of volume one f...more

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Dec 09, 2008 Avis Black rated it 1 of 5 stars

Shelves: classics-i-loathed

I read the whole damn thing, for which I feel like demanding a medal. A famous quote about this work goes, "I may be thicker skinned than most, but I just can't understand why anyone should take thirty pages to describe how he tosses about in bed because he can't get to sleep. I clutched my head."

I heartily agree. Nor do I like dinner parties that take longer to read about than they took to occur. The main problem with Proust (and his admirers) is that they are convinced that the French aristocr...more

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Aug 03, 2008 Foodpie rated it 5 of 5 stars

Remembrances of Things Past is the definition of a difficult book. Epic in scope, scale and length, it challenges the mind and the patience. That it is one of the greatest accomplishments in literature in the history of man kin is unquestionable. Where that leaves the reader is up to debate. It is impossible for a books of such length and scale to have a singular effect on the reader, and to attempt to define it in such a simple venue is the height of hubris. What can be said humbly is that Reme...more

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Jul 09, 2010 Dom Zuccone rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: art-aesthetics, fiction

This book should be in drawer of the bedside table of every hotel room. It is a guide to a world that was disappearing as it was written, but unexpectedly returns in the recognition of what the reader will see, but didn't recognise. It is a long voyage with an obnoxious, demanding man who excrutiatingly reveals the nuances of the forms of beauty in the arts of capture and captivity. It is to be devoured by an Impressionist painting. It is to be invited into world where only art is intimate and h...more

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May 17, 2013 Petra marked it as to-read

1Q84

Swann's Way (read Apr/2011)
Wow! A beautifully told & good story.
A slow, meandering, detailed and lovingly ponderous look at Memory (forgotten, remembered, accuracy), Time (continuous continuum, linear, lost), Love and Nostalgia.
Not for the lovers of fast-paced, action-packed drama. Not to be read swiftly but to be slowly savoured and chewed over. Funny, too, at times. Proust does have a sense of humour.
In essence, without giving anything away, Swann’s Way is told in 3 interconnected st...more 1Q84

Swann's Way (read Apr/2011)
Wow! A beautifully told & good story.
A slow, meandering, detailed and lovingly ponderous look at Memory (forgotten, remembered, accuracy), Time (continuous continuum, linear, lost), Love and Nostalgia.
Not for the lovers of fast-paced, action-packed drama. Not to be read swiftly but to be slowly savoured and chewed over. Funny, too, at times. Proust does have a sense of humour.
In essence, without giving anything away, Swann’s Way is told in 3 interconnected stories: one of childhood memories (soft, dreamy), one of painful, excruciating love (manic, driven, full of despair) and one of adult nostalgia and remembrance (sad, reminiscent, joyful, poignant). Proust brings the reader into these worlds and lets them experience them with the characters.
This volume is a stand-alone, if one so wishes, but there are many open questions left to be answered; many unresolved situations to be explained. I’ll be continuing with this book and look forward to the idea of knowing the characters better and meeting new ones.
I really enjoyed Proust’s characters: the sickly Narrator, Aunt Leonie, Uncle Adolphe, Swann, Odette, Vinteuil. They are all warm, “real” beings that the reader comes to feel for.
Proust captures so many moments in Life: the stab of fear & pain that comes from the thought that one is losing one’s love to someone else, the jealousy brought on by an uncertain relationship, the demanding love & yearning of a child for his beloved mother, trees at their moment of coming to life in the earliest of spring when only the trees know that the weather & season are turning, the taste of a madeline dipped in tea…and so many others.
There are numerous beautiful sentences with descriptions that make the reader look at ordinary situations and items in a different light. Most are too long to quote (Proust loves his run-on sentences) but here are a few:

“…that it was indeed my love for her that I was gradually making grow, as a book grows when one is writing it.”

“…and helped me to understand how paradoxical it is to seek in reality for the pictures that are stored in one’s memory….the reality that I had known no longer existed….the places we have known belong now only to the little world of space on which we map them for our own convenience.”

“Remembrance of a particular form is but regret for a particular moment.”
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Apr 30, 2013 Gil D. rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Se per uno stupido gioco o un inevitabile destino, dovessi scegliere un solo volume di un solo romanzo, da portare con me in un'altra vita, non avrei dubbi.
Sceglierei l'ultimo volume della Recherche, di quello che è il libro più importante e più amato di questa vita: vorrei avere sempre con me "Il Tempo Ritrovato".
Se invece, sotto tortura e già pentendomene, dovessi estrarre dalla Recherche qualche decina di pagine da consigliare come trailer ad un lettore perduto, sconfitto, ma ancora attratt...more Se per uno stupido gioco o un inevitabile destino, dovessi scegliere un solo volume di un solo romanzo, da portare con me in un'altra vita, non avrei dubbi.
Sceglierei l'ultimo volume della Recherche, di quello che è il libro più importante e più amato di questa vita: vorrei avere sempre con me "Il Tempo Ritrovato".
Se invece, sotto tortura e già pentendomene, dovessi estrarre dalla Recherche qualche decina di pagine da consigliare come trailer ad un lettore perduto, sconfitto, ma ancora attratto (un lettore che ha rinunciato a malincuore al piacere di leggerla, insomma), consiglierei non le prime (dove si sono arenate le buone intenzioni di gran parte dei naufragati) ma, all'incirca, le ottanta pagine centrali del Tempo Ritrovato e le sue ultime venti. Sono le pagine che vanno dalla morte di Saint-Loup, all'entrata del narratore sul selciato del cortile del palazzo dei Guermantes. E quelle che, dalla comparsa di figlia di Saint-Loup e Gilberte, arrivano alla parola "Tempo", che chiude il romanzo.
Sono precedute, da una discesa vertiginosa nelle tenebre della guerra e della notte su Parigi, del vizio, del fallimento delle illusioni: le più cupe e disperate. E sono separate da una passeggiata indimenticabile, guardando l'azione del Tempo su visi e caratteri, fra le luci di un ricevimento mondano: le più impietose, disincantate e perfidamente disvelatrici.
Mi farebbe sentire meno in colpa per questa profanazione l'illudermi che Marcel, grande profanatore, certo non sarebbe contento, ma forse capirebbe. E anche il fatto che la Recherche, si sa, ha una struttura circolare (anulare, direbbe Wallace), per cui il racconto finisce con la decisione dell'autore di cominciare a scriverlo. Chissà che anche il lettore perduto non sia indotto da quelle cento pagine a cominciare a leggerlo.
Ecco, lì c'è l'essenza, il nocciolo del potentissimo reattore nucleare della Recherche: lì c'è la sua barra incandescente e radioattiva, quella da cui nasce l'energia che illumina tutta la Cattedrale.
Con il timore che il lettore perduto, non sapendo come è arrivato sin lì e dove esattamente si trovi, vaghi cieco e sordo. E con la speranza che ne sia invece definitivamente contaminato.(less)

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Mar 30, 2013 Mark rated it 5 of 5 stars

The greatest work of literature I've ever read - a strong sentiment, but one I honestly feel.

Having bitten the bullet and worked my way through it much of it in extended sittings on a two-day boat journey in South East Asia!) I've come to believe that Proust and A La Recherche du Temp Perdu is the most under-known work of art I've ever come across.

Its genius is in detailing the minutiae of French salon life to the tiniest detail, whilst somehow maintaining a momentum and a rhythm which keeps the...more

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Dec 05, 2012 Garth rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: fiction

“Swann in Love” chronicles the misplaced infatuation of Charles Swann, a friend of Marcel’s family, over a coquette named Odette de Crécy. Proust’s congenitally cynical view of love, which much of his writing treats not as recognition but as illusion, allows him to relate the plot of the romance with the minute attention and inverted dramatic scale of a clinician following symptoms, even using terms like “disease” and “convalesce.” A collector of art, a connoisseur, something of a dilettante, Sw...more

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Nov 23, 2012 Piperitapitta marked it as to-read · review of another edition

Shelves: autori-francesi, letteratura-francese, romanzo

La strada di Swann ****
01/09/2008 - 17/10/2008

copio e incollo il commento che ho aggiunto nel gruppo di lettura a caldo. tutto sommato le mie impressioni, anche a freddo, restano le stesse.
a posteriori, avendo iniziato ieri il secondo volume All'ombra delle fanciulle in fiore posso aggiungere di aver ripreso a seguire con piacere le vicende che vi si narrano.

finito! complice qualche giornata lavorativa poco lavorativa, ho potuto terminare la lettura di questo primo volume della ricerca. non nego...more

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Oct 22, 2012 Frank Jude rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: fiction-novels

Okay, so last year, just before my 55th birthday, I bought this boxed set of In Search Of Lost Time and decided that the time had come for me to "read Proust." I've had this on my "bucket list" since my twenties!

Yesterday, as I celebrated my 56th birthday, I completed Volume One, Swann's Way and at this rate, I'll be 62 when I finish the full novel! What can I say? I've never read anything like this, and doubt there IS anything like it. Proust writes with amazing detail, in these long rambling s...more

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Dec 26, 2012 Bill Hammack rated it 5 of 5 stars

About ten years ago I read the first volume and half of the second. Found it interesting but .... When I was a teenager our next door neighbor, Mrs. Emery, a retired English teacher advised me to tackle Proust after I was 40. Good advice. In light of just the normal loses in life (death of friends, and a dream or two!) I find Proust fascinating now. This will seem like a crying sham, but I read for the story and grab what philosophy I can from it. (Proust could never decide if he was writing a n...more About ten years ago I read the first volume and half of the second. Found it interesting but .... When I was a teenager our next door neighbor, Mrs. Emery, a retired English teacher advised me to tackle Proust after I was 40. Good advice. In light of just the normal loses in life (death of friends, and a dream or two!) I find Proust fascinating now. This will seem like a crying sham, but I read for the story and grab what philosophy I can from it. (Proust could never decide if he was writing a novel or an essay, so he wrote a novelish essay or an essayish novel - the novel being, as he said, "the form from which it least departs.) I find an incrediable richness to it - the invention of characters rivals Shakespeare. So, far I've found the end of Swnn's Way to be very moving -- the section where a grown up Marcel observers the Bois de Boulogne filled with people, but he no longer recognizes anyone. (p. 598 volume I, although I think Proust orignally had this at the end of the first section of volume II, which would make sense.) I find this section very moving. It captures how I have often felt -- and it ties in with a time in the past that Amy and I visited the Bois. From time to time I find aphorism I just love: "Like many intellectuals, he was incapable of saying a simle thing in a simple way. He would find some precious qualifier for every statement, and would sweep from the particular to the general." (volume II, p. 629) Another that I like a great deal is this: Marcel, the narrator, has been talking to his young girls, he reflects that he can uses their voices like "an experimenter who seeks by corroborative proofs to establish the truth of his theory." "And it is, after all, as good a way as any of solving the problem of existance to get near enough to the things and people that have appeared to us beautiful and mysterious from a distance to be able to satisfy ourselves that they have neight mystery nor beauty. It is one of the systems of mental hygiene among which we are at liberty to choose our own, a system which is perhaps not to be recommended too strongly, but gives us a certain tranquillity with which to spend what remains of our life, and also -- since it enables us to regret nothing, by assuring us that we have attained to the best, and that the best was nothing out of the ordinary -- with which to resign ourselves to death." (Volume II, p. 721) I finished volume II on a flight to Orange County - I have found Proust to be, suprisingly, a very good airplane book(less)

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Oct 03, 2012 Neale rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: literary-fiction, in-translation

What can you say about Proust’s perfumed cathedral of prose? I managed to make it all the way through, beginning with wonderment – absolute wonderment, like a child watching a magic-lantern show, not wanting it to finish, ever – proceeding with admiration (sometimes baffled), continuing with bouts of annoyance, ending with a mixture of wonder, admiration and frustration. And exhaustion. Personally, I would give up all the other books in the series for ‘Combray’, which is one of the wonders of th...more

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Feb 16, 2009 Angela rated it 5 of 5 stars

I know I've been blabbering about it for a while, but this was the first fiction I read in years that had that same charm for me that novels had when I was young. I completely lost myself in them. I'm ready to start them over but I have to get through a certain amount of my sabbatical work first :)

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About Marcel Proust

French novelist, best known for his 3000 page masterpiece À la recherche du temps perdu (Remembrance of Things Past or In Search of Lost Time), a pseudo-autobiographical novel told mostly in a stream-of-consciousness style. Born in the first year of the Third Republic, the young Marcel, like his narrator, was a delicate child from a bourgeois family. He was active in Parisian high society during t...more

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Books by Marcel Proust

Swann's Way (In Search of Lost Time, #1)

In the Shadow of Young Girls in Flower (In Search of Lost Time, #2)

Remembrance of Things Past: Volume I - Swann's Way & Within a Budding Grove

The Guermantes Way (In Search of Lost Time, #3)

Sodom and Gomorrah (In Search of Lost Time, #4)

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“Our worst fears, like our greatest hopes, are not outside our powers, and we can come in the end to triumph over the former and to achieve the latter.” — 5 people liked it

“But, when nothing subsists of an old past, after the death of people, after the destruction of things, alone, frailer but more enduring, more immaterial, more persistent, more faithful, smell and taste still remain for a long time, like souls, remembering, waiting, hoping, on the ruin of all the rest, bearing without giving way, on their almost impalpable droplet, the immense edifice of memory.” — 5 people liked it

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