ReemK10 (Paper Pills)’s Comments (group member since Dec 26, 2012)

ReemK10 (Paper Pills)’s comments from the The Year of Reading Proust group.

Jeremy wrote: "Shaken not stirred"

witty :)

Jeremy wrote: "I feel like a prude now!"

Sometimes, I feel like just shaking Jeremy and telling him to say what's on his mind without having to apologize for it first. Aloha, watch it with the spoilers. There, no harm done. ;)

My take on things is that for Proust, love for him has always been defined by his relationship with his mother, his obsessive need for her, and her being held back by the father from coddling him as she would have liked. So he has always sought that desperate need for loving her in others. It may explain Swann's love for a woman like Odette since Odette regards love with men on conditional terms. Proust craves an unconditional love. Does he ever find it?

Nick wrote: "Dear fellow Groupians,

Here's a lovely featurette from a French TV show on Aunt Leonie's house in Illiers Combray.

http://www.wat.tv/video/visite-guidee...

Lots of ..."

Great find Nick! I enjoyed the mini tour of Tante Leonie's house. As for Kafka being funny, I think it has to do with his writing what is essentially the absurd.

J.A. wrote: "ReemK10 wrote: Hmm, I'm not German, but I too think Kafka is hilarious. Is this considered rather unusual?

I assumed it was but maybe not? Of course parts of The Metamorphosis are pretty funny but..."

Thanks for the link! I thought I would read this section first and then go back and read the posts, but that was clearly a bad idea. They pile up fast, and I am way behind in trying to read them all.

@Fionnula, sorry to hear about your sprained ankle. Take it easy and try to keep it wrapped up. I hope you iced it when you first sprained your ankle.

J.A. wrote: "Apparently Germans think Kafka is hilarious and I've been told it has to do with the way Germans tell jokes."

Hmm, I'm not German, but I too think Kafka is hilarious. Is this considered rather unusual?

As for me, I find that the good doctor, Dr. Cottard, who takes everything literally and does not pick up on social cues or on vetbal intonations in conversation that he has to study people's faces to understand just screams Asperger's.

J.A. wrote: "Does anyone else think Dr. Cottard has Asperger's?

Oh! Dr. Cottard is based on a real doctor, Jules Cotard: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jules_Co.... Cotard Delusion sounds fascinating."

Yes, I thought so from the very beginning! And the funny thing is Asperger's hadn't become a syndrome when Proust was writing this, but he clearly picked up on the behavior.

I would say high functioning Asperger's.

Cheryl wrote: "Now that I am nearly finished with Swann's Way I've worked more on the thumbprint for my scroll expressing my experience of beginning to read Proust.

Something was not quite right in my collage o..."

Good for you! I'm excited to see what resonated with you from your readings. You're so lucky to be creative!I too can't wait to see your art!

Cheryl wrote: "Marcelita wrote: "Came across this...which those in the UK may have seen already.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2013/..."

Thank you, Marcelita. I peruse..."

Cheryl, what you've written is better than any blurb I've ever read. Anyone reading this, would rush to the nearest bookstore/ library to get ISOLT! Beautifully written!

It's funny, I was just going through my bookmarks and found this by Sam Tanenhaus, Editor of the Book Review:

Proust’s “Remembrance of Things Past.” The book is more about sorrows than joys, but keyed to “the intermittences of the heart.

He was recommending this book as a Valentine's Day gift to a special someone, actually as a last-minute Valentine's Day gift.

Eugene wrote: "indeed there will be time" for each of us to answer these questions for ourselves, "to prepare a face to meet the faces that you meet".


Smiles at Eugene chanelling T.S. Eliot.That was quite lovely.

Proustitute wrote: "ReemK10 (Got Proust?) wrote: "Did Proust ever write poetry? You would think that he would write the most perfect poems."

Penguin is publishing his complete poems in a bilingual edition in March: h..."

So, he did write poems. I knew he had to be a poet. Thanks for the link.

Proustitute wrote: "Isn't it? Love Gide's comment. Hah!"

That was priceless. Thanks for the laughs!

Proustitute wrote: "Proust review NyQuil @HTMLGiant: http://htmlgiant.com/random/proust-re..."

That's hilarious!

Did Proust ever write poetry? You would think that he would write the most perfect poems.

Jeremy wrote: "I love book references within books. LOVE. Though I read Black Boy in high school after I was blown away with Native Son and decided to do a study on Richard Wright. (for class credit, of course)..."

I'm just reading this now Jeremy, but you should definitely check out https://www.smalldemons.com/ if you like/LOVE book references within books.

Marcelita wrote: "Aloha wrote: "BTW, the ML "Arabian Nights" is "Mile et une Nuits", which is "a thousand and one nights", which is a better term fitting with time than "Arabian Nights.""

After reading somewhere th..."

You're an amazing researcher!!! Thanks for the links!

Elizabeth wrote: "Odette's looks: ...she just wasnt Swann's type. He liked "rosy, abundant flesh" or some such, whereas...well, look up ..."

Didn't the narrator tell us that Swann was attracted to female beauty of the common type? Socializing with the Verdurins when he was used to socializing with the elite shows that he prefers his women trashy rather than aristocratic.

Proustitute wrote: "Obviously ISOLT can't be totally "spoiled" with giving away the plot: as everyone knows by now, it's a philosophical text, an aesthetic text"

I have this nagging thought that if we know "Proust believed that the life of an artist should be of no interest to us: only his work counts", and if we also know that we are to read ISOLT as a philosophical novel as Proustitute says above, why is it that we are delving so deeply into all this biography? Is it to please ourselves as readers, to find out as much as we can about an author that we admire in our artistic idolatry of him?

We are actually reading as two groups, the first time readers and those rereading, or on their third or fourth reads, and this has me wondering if we're concentrating on all the art and family relations because the group that has read the book already knows the plot, and therefore for their reread are paying more attention to detail this time. I guess what I'm saying is should the first time reader immerse his/ her self into these biographical, art topics or whether we should just read ISOLT trying to understand the psychological and social content that is essential to understanding the characters? Does this make sense or am I rambing? I guess what I'm saying is that this is a totally new reading experience for me, and while it has taught me to be more mindful in my reading of all the objects and author biography, is this at the expense of reading the characters?

Fionnuala wrote: "Thoré-Bürgur's discovery of Vermeer when he stumbled upon his 'View of Delft' in a museum in Holland may also have inspired a scene involving Bergotte much later.
[spoilers removed]"

All these links are fabulous, none more so than the spoilers!! I doubt that there is anyone in our discovery-hungry group who will think, spoiler, oh better not read that now. You all know you're going to click on it. :)