Joni’s Comments (group member since Nov 21, 2013)

Joni’s comments from the Reading Proust's In Search of Lost Time in 2014 group.

The film "I, Don Giovanni" by Carlos Saura gives insight into the character of Casanova, whose confession becomes Mozart's opera "Don Giovanni". Maybe Jonathan, it’s better to watch the film or attend an opera by Mozart than read the 12 volumes of Casanova’s seductions, which must become irksome after the first couple, let alone an entire 12 volumes. The film is about the relationship between Casanova and the librettist of the opera, Lorenzo da Ponte, who both like to enjoy themselves when it comes to women. Worth a look if only to whet your appetite for those 12 volumes, if you really must...I have been reading "G" by John Berger, which is based on a Casanova/Don Juan like character and I must say that I find his ambition in life, to seduce and bed women rather boring, when compared to other men's ambitions/exploits (for instance G is immersed in trying to seduce a hotel maid while the aviator Jorge Chavez flies across the Alps).

http://publicdomainreview.org/2013/11...
a sampler of the first chapter of Paintings in Proust relevant to the first volume

I’m Joan/Joni and I’ve been indirectly bumping into Proust for around a decade now, reading secondary texts on Proust, rather than reading Proust. I’m a textile artist (with a background in art history, and art therapy) living in the Dandenong Ranges, about 40 km out of Melbourne. What I like about Proust, and what I’m starting to appreciate even more as I start to read is the way for Proust art interpenetrates the fabric of the everyday. I have a similar relationship with art/artists, writers/ books –art can inform my consciousness and enable me to make sense of my experience, as well as make meaning.

I picked up Proust’s The Prisoner and the Fugitive because it happened to be lying about; on loan (my partner had borrowed it from a friend but had never actually opened it). I found The Prisoner rather hard going because of Marcel and the quirks of his jealousy (I won’t put in any spoilers). Actually the mention of jealousy reminds me that I heard a TED talk about a month or so ago by Parul Sehgal who suggests that it is fiction, (including Proust’s In Search of Lost Time) rather than science that ‘demystifies’ and ‘domesticates’ this vile but necessary emotion. Jealousy for instance, ‘cracks us open’, and allows us to know what we love and want (a love object can be a person or a book –I’d been jealous of those who could plough through Proust, for instance). It was this TED talk that decided for me it was time to get to grips with my own jealousies, starting with the one about reading Proust…Below is the link to Parul Sehgal’s talk, if anyone is interested.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_x1qku...

@ Jonathan, I feel that is wrong (here I am imagining a place where you’re going to seal yourself off, which may not be your intention at all – cork lined? What happens to consciousness in a cork-lined room? Sorry but for me I can only imagine it as brown, boring and dry. Proust looked out the windows often). And with reading Proust you need lots of windows from which to look out and up from the words/or at least a dog with which to distract you, not to mention people passing by and gossiping. Lots of breathing for your eyes between sentences, paragraphs and in between sections though sometimes Proust doesn’t give you enough of that (particularly so in The Prisoner, reading I felt a prisoner of the text just waiting for the next full stop). I find the best books send you into your own reveries or madly looking about for that recipe for the meal that you've just savoured through the words. Though I haven't been successful with cooking madeleines (they were rather dry and definitely in need of soaking in a cup of tea but I do intend to try again)...as for the perfume of asparagus in a chamber pot, well I know about that! Though I would not call it perfume and at the back of my mind I’m thinking of that lovely asparagus that I saw at the supermarket last week and what I could do with asparagus as they are in season(but I don’t want to spoil it for you and others, though the madeleine and asparagus bits are well known). I’m going to aim to incorporate reading Proust into the very fabric of my mundane daily existence, as well as the making of some art works – because Proust is a phenomenologist and he encourages the same activity in his readers.
So when you sit there with the paintings book beside you Jonathan at least you can take a break from the words and focus on the image. Don't forget to take that into the cork-lined room ;-)...


@Alia, thanks for the clarification. Don’t know about blast but he definitely makes you stop and think, dream, or reassess your own memories…Looking forward to the posts…

Wow lots of prep - like the marathon man and let's face it Proust is like taking on a marathon in reading.

Hi Jonathan
I've started on the Moncrieff et al. version several times and didn't get beyond the first twenty pages (so not even up to the famous passage about the madeleine dipped in tea). My partner had picked up Vol 5 of the Penguin edition from a friend of his, which I had kept on my bedside table for almost ten months, before I started reading it several weeks ago.

I agree with you about the different translators, as I found the tone of The Prisoner much different to The Fugitive, (but that may have been the case in the original). I've started on The Way by Swann's and again that's also different, and much more 'readable'. I'll probably continue with the Penguin translations. Maybe the different translators don't matter as there are so many inconsistencies in the original text or the way a character behaves (and life is like that – inconsistent and contrary). I would have liked Lydia Davis to have done the whole 9,000 pages but perhaps that would have meant the Penguin edition would have taken ages to complete. I had done a little research about what was the best translation to read, and someone I came across suggested starting on Lydia Davis and then reading the rest in Moncrieff translation.

I also think that the book Paintings in Proust would be a wonderful companion, and that book uses the Moncrieff. I’ve found an extract of the book on line which helps my reading with The Way by Swann’s.

I came to Proust by way of Alain de Botton, though it's such a flimsy book. I'm coming to a little understanding (after almost 900 pages of reading)...Proust is a sensibility, not only to take your time but to consider your choices (the titles come from walks in Marcel’s childhood at Combray - to go the way by Swann's or the way by Guermantes’ which is longer)...so to even engage in a discussion about translations before the exercise of reading begins, is Proustian. ;-) At the moment I’m going the way by Lydia Davis…

Hello
Wondering about your reasons for sticking to the older translation, rather than the more recent by Penguin.
Cheers
Joni