false <![CDATA[How Proust Can Change Your Life: Not a Novel]]> http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1167403525m/23420.jpg 23420 21 This is a genius-level piece of writing that manages to blend literary biography with self-help and tongue-in-cheek with the profound. The quirky, early 1900s French author Marcel Proust acts as the vessel for surprisingly impressive nuggets of wisdom on down-to-earth topics such as why you should never sleep with someone on the first date, how to protect yourself against lower back pain, and how to cope with obnoxious neighbors. Here's proof that our ancestors had just as much insight as the gurus du jour and perhaps a lot more wit. De Botton simultaneously pokes fun at the self-help movement and makes a significant contribution to its archives. 1198968 book 2004 How Proust Can Change Your Life: Not a Novel total:1222|5:291|4:465|3:354|2:85|1:27| 1222 4574 1960 167 5 5 false false Thu Jul 10 12:39:41 -0700 2008 Thu Jul 10 12:41:49 -0700 2008 more...]]> 5 2 false false Wed Aug 01 00:00:00 -0700 2007 Thu Aug 16 02:51:26 -0700 2007 Thu Aug 16 02:58:26 -0700 2007 for--that you end up sitting up with all night long.

Afterwards, sat outside with Mickey and reminisced about our childhood and what we expected from the future.

Also, that what we reall...more...]]> 5 3 false false Thu Feb 14 11:39:52 -0800 2008 Thu May 15 11:11:38 -0700 2008 more...]]> 5 3 false false Tue Mar 18 13:08:09 -0700 2008 Tue Mar 18 16:44:57 -0700 2008 3 1 false false Sat Apr 19 10:36:32 -0700 2008 Sat Apr 19 10:36:32 -0700 2008 more...]]> 5 1 false false Tue Aug 11 19:13:33 -0700 2009 Tue Aug 11 19:19:54 -0700 2009 How Proust Can Change Your Life is something of a conundrum. The book is at once a piece of literary criticism and a self-help book, and at the same time neither of those. That is, it analyzes the literature and life of Marcel Proust and is structured in the regular "...more...]]> 1 2 false false Tue Jun 30 15:41:56 -0700 2009 Tue Jun 30 15:54:17 -0700 2009 more...]]> 3 0 false false Mon Jan 01 00:00:00 -0800 2007 Thu Jun 11 20:38:57 -0700 2009 Thu Jun 11 20:50:37 -0700 2009 more...]]> 5 0 false false Wed Jun 24 14:32:49 -0700 2009 Thu Jun 25 17:20:38 -0700 2009
Alain de Botton wowed me before with his Consolations of Philosophy, which left me with an overwhelming sense of clarity, and my friends in the certainty that...more...]]> 3 0 false false Tue Aug 25 00:00:00 -0700 2009 Fri Aug 21 08:43:18 -0700 2009 Tue Aug 25 08:13:42 -0700 2009
I really liked the last chapter on "How to Put Books Down," where de Botton says "It was a symbol of what R...more...]]> 5 0 false false Mon Jan 01 00:00:00 -0800 2007 Thu Feb 26 04:44:09 -0800 2009 Thu Feb 26 04:45:12 -0800 2009
Yes, don't go so fast...stop, savor and enjoy the many extraordinary pleasures of the ordinary things which are strewn around your everyday life.

This gem of a book is filled with these kind of delightful bon-mots distilled from Proust's life and works....more...]]> 4 0 false false Sun Feb 15 00:00:00 -0800 2009 Sun Feb 08 01:41:25 -0800 2009 Sun Feb 15 11:59:29 -0800 2009 more...]]> 4 0 false false Mon Jul 27 19:39:49 -0700 2009 Mon Jul 27 19:39:49 -0700 2009 more...]]> 0 1 false false Mon Jun 01 00:00:00 -0700 2009 Fri May 01 08:29:53 -0700 2009 Fri Jun 05 12:48:30 -0700 2009 more...]]> 5 0 false false Tue Jun 30 00:00:00 -0700 2009 Wed Jul 15 10:06:14 -0700 2009 Wed Jul 15 10:55:42 -0700 2009
One of the book's major themes was on the purpose of art, both visual art and novels. Proust's theory is that despair arises when our observations about our daily life become stale giving...more...]]> 4 0 false false Sun May 03 13:51:46 -0700 2009 Sun May 03 13:57:02 -0700 2009 more...]]> 5 0 false false Tue Jan 01 00:00:00 -0800 2002 Fri Oct 30 19:57:55 -0700 2009 Fri Oct 30 20:05:04 -0700 2009 more...]]> 3 0 false false Sun Jul 12 00:00:00 -0700 2009 Fri Jul 10 14:44:27 -0700 2009 Mon Aug 24 06:50:40 -0700 2009 ...more...]]> 4 1 false false Thu Jan 01 00:00:00 -0800 2009 Fri Feb 13 02:51:22 -0800 2009 Fri Feb 13 02:54:43 -0800 2009 more...]]> 4 0 false false Fri Aug 28 00:00:00 -0700 2009 Wed Jul 15 19:13:42 -0700 2009 Wed Oct 07 19:39:03 -0700 2009
*How to Suffer Successfully*

Those who are "bad sufferers" do not learn or grow from their grief. Proust believes that surviving difficult times makes a pe...more...]]> http://www.goodreads.com/book_link/follow/8?book_id=23420