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

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

Fionnuala wrote: "Phillida wrote: "...I'm fascinated by the conception and acting-out of an idea of love that is purely egocentric, that requires jealousy and misery, that does not require reciprocity. It diverges v..."

I don't think that is the line that Fionnuala was referring to.Could it be:

....this observation of La Bruyere: "Men often want to love where they cannot hope to succeed; they seek their own undoing without being able to compass it, and if I may put it thus, they are forced against their will to remain free." Whether or not this is the meaning that the aphorism had for the man who wrote it( to give it this meaning, which would make it finer, he should have said " to be loved" instead of " to love"), there is no doubt that, with this meaning, the sensitive lover of literature reanimates it and swells it with meaning until is ready to burst, he cannot repeat it to himself without overflowing with joy, so true and beautiful does he find it -- but in spite of all this he has added to it nothing, it remains merely an observation of La Bruyere." (MKE 297)


... and Fionnuala, I will also be borrowing your Barnes quote. Merci! :)

Phillida wrote: "ReemK10 (Paper Pills)

Reem, Thank you for your many and interesting links. I've enjoyed a lot of the articles and was introduced to such interesting online publications."


Oh Phillida, I must warn you, you will most certainly develop an addiction for reading all these wonderful articles like I have. Then you will sit for long periods of time with your neck in an awkward position with your head thrust forward, and you will develop chronic headaches, maybe even migraines. Everything in moderation!

@Kalliope, like I said the Google Gods are good to me! :)

Kate wrote: "La vraie vie...c'est la litterature. (MP)

reminds me of Logan Pearsall Smith :"People say that Life is the thing but on the whole I prefer reading."

Or, Flaubert : "Le seul moyen de supporter la ..."

Thank you Kate! I am going to borrow this to post on my tumblr!!

Rise and Shine

Daily Rituals: How Great Minds Make Time, Find Inspiration, and Get to Work

Mentions Proust, Mann, Joyce:
http://www.literaryreview.co.uk/hart_...

And for the German readers: Karen...
It's actually in English, but German speakers should enjoy it:

Schottenfreude delves into every nook of the human condition: childhood and death, wealth and debt, joy and sorry, wisdom and error, loathing and lust. And the references cited are equally diverse: from William Shakespeare, F. Scott Fitzgerald and Marcel Proust to Nelson Mandela, Eminem, and Justin Bieber.

http://www.omnivoracious.com/2013/12/...

It is no accident that English turns to German in times of emotional turmoil. From Angst to Zeitgeist, the German language has a proven ability to express the inexpressible.

For our Spanish readers: Kalliope, Patricia...

http://hermidaeditores.blogspot.com.e...

and saw this too: http://www.ilsole24ore.com/art/strenn...

I stumbled across this and wanted to share it with you all. Marcelita most probably posted this link before.

Click on each image.A Proustian Gallery:
Selected Works from the Harvard Art Museums

http://www.proust-arts.com/overview.html

There's more Private Proust: Letters and Drawings to Reynaldo Hahn
http://www.proust-arts.com/private-pr...

Proust's Paris: Photographs from the Collections of the Harvard Art Museums:
http://www.proust-arts.com/prousts-pa...

Discussed in this essay:

The Everything Store: Jeff Bezos and the Age of Amazon,


http://harpers.org/archive/2013/12/th...

"Ah, the customer — that delicious, discerning, weak-willed figure! For Bezos, the customer is everything: a comrade, a dependent, and a kind of theological entity, on whose altar almost any sacrifice is reasonable. If you can deliver the lowest prices and widest selection and speediest shipping, won’t your customer forgive just about anything? Speaking as one (and how), I can say that the answer is no. If the choice is between paying an extra two dollars for a paperback and putting an entire industry to the torch, I’m willing to ante up."

I am too!

Funny, he says:For a brief period, Bezos considered launching his online bookstore under the auspices of D. E. Shaw. But in the end, he struck out on his own, inspired in part by Kazuo Ishiguro’s The Remains of the Day, from which Bezos distilled what he called a “regret-minimization framework” — an unusual response to Ishiguro’s soft-spoken, melancholy narrative.

“What is more, sir," his lordship went on, "I believe I have a good idea of what you mean by 'professionalism.' It appears to mean getting one's way by cheating and manipulating. It appears to mean serving the dictates of greed and advantage rather than those of goodness and the desire to see justice prevail in the world. If that is the 'professionalism' you refer to, sir, I don't care much for it and have no wish to acquire it.”
― Kazuo Ishiguro, The Remains of the Day

Book Portrait wrote: "ReemK10 (Paper Pills) wrote: "Hey BP, where have you been lately? Thanks for the links."

I dropped behind a little (end of the night in Paris during the war). I'm reading [book:The Paris Wife|8683..."

It's good to see you back BP. I started The Paris Wife, but put it down to read Proust. I'll pick it back up soon.

Fionnuala, I don't know if you've noticed this but you are in dire need of intense intellectual stimualation/ distraction. You better start making a list of challenging books to read for next year!

Okay wonderful, you were both analyzing so carefully, I was afraid that you were missing out on the joy of reading and there you were both hypnotized! :)
Kalliope, how intriguing that you recreated the effect of Proust's bedroom. I will read anywhere and anytime that I am not next to my laptop and the hopeless addiction I've developed to it!

Kalliope wrote: "ReemK10 (Paper Pills) wrote: "I wonder with so many of you studying Proust as you are, carefully making mental notes on everything,if you ever just experience the aesthetic beauty of the text. I wa..."

Kalliope, I really don't know how to describe it because you and I are reading two different versions of Proust, and for sure in the original French, it has to be ultimately more superior. But Martin I believe understands where I'm coming from. Remember at the beginning where we said that the Davis translation was pure music, well MKE has ups and downs, and that is why I sometimes think that 2 different people are translating here because they are of two extremes, or perhaps that is the original intention of Proust, that we go through daily life, slowly, laboriously, and then bam he takes us for a roller coaster ride and has us holding on to every word for dear life. That, in any case is how I have been reading Proust. I hated the war section, and yes, I wasn't feeling well in the days that I was reading it, but now it's like without a doubt Time Regained is getting its five star rating! For me, personally I don't think I could do an audio listen because the voice on the audio would stick in my head, and I would be reading it listening to that voice. I have to hear Proust's words in my own head for me to enjoy them.
I loved where he said some authors resort to description while others make an impression on the reader. Proust gives us our very own foam memory pillow.

It's funny how the madeleine moment is the one most referred to when people write about Proust (articles), and yes it is is a good introduction, but there is sooooo much more!

I wonder with so many of you studying Proust as you are, carefully making mental notes on everything,if you ever just experience the aesthetic beauty of the text. I was reading Proust while I was on the exercise bike at the gym, and 55 minutes later, I suddenly looked up from my reading and constant underlining and wondered if the people around me had any idea what kind of emotional work out I had just been through. It had to be written on my face! How can a novel written so long ago, just speak so personally to me? And mind you, I'm only reading the translation. I can only imagine what euphoria those of you reading in French must feel. The line between the narrator and the reader has just about diminished...

The pleasures of Proust

http://strandbooks.tumblr.com/

Critical thinking #4: Daniel Mendelsohn

This is part of an ongoing series of interviews about the art of criticism.


http://www.prospectmagazine.co.uk/mag...

What is it about Proust?! I sometimes feel as if two different people are collaborating on this novel. There are parts where the reading drags, and then the reader comes across a section of brilliance and pure genius, and I find myself underlining almost everything I read! It makes me wonder, because he did so much editing, what was happening to him when he wrote the good parts! I get it! I get why people read Proust! Now, I want to go back over this last portion to read the words slowly to savor them!

Book Portrait wrote: "Not on Proust but potentially of interest to some:

A few days ago an excellent documentary was aired on French television about the Roaring Twenties in France: "Paris, Années Folles: De Montmartre..."

Hey BP, where have you been lately? Thanks for the links.

Kalliope wrote: "ReemK10 (Paper Pills) wrote: "

Sorry, Reem - like Kall, I'm trying to 'read and decipher' Proust himself thr..."

It looks very good. I have printed it."

The Google Gods are good to me Kalliope!

Fionnuala wrote: "ReemK10 (Paper Pills) wrote: "It would be great if you would all read it and decipher it a bit more"

Sorry, Reem - like Kall, I'm trying to 'read and decipher' Proust himself through our own excha..."

smiles @Fionnuala and Kalliope :) No short cuts with you two! Okay, when you get to the end, come back and revisit this and see if you come to the same conclusion.

I think this theory of allegory really does make sense in understanding what Proust was trying to do. I will need to read, and reread this several times to fully comprehend the meaning behind transcending time. It would be great if you would all read it and decipher it a bit more....

@Fionnuala, not my explanations. I only copy and paste. Check out the link.

Kalliope wrote: "Fionnuala wrote: "Kalliope wrote: "And now on the most precious colors, those found in the tails of the peacocks. The iridescence of the feathers had been an enigma until modern times... ..."

Th..."

Kalliope, you're brilliant! To add to the peacock theme:

To illustrate this transcendental process in reading, let's have a look at the resurrection of Balbec in Le Temps retrouvé : The very moment stages Balbec in a new, curious, even dream-like anatomy which realizes the rapport unique in a bizarre allegorical transformation of life (thus performing some pages of the inner book of ' Marcel ') : The vision released by the stiff napkin brings back the salted air of Balbec, but in the form of a female bosom; furthermore, the servant of the prince arrives in this scenery and opens a window to the beach, where the friends of that time re-appear and invite ' Marcel ' to a walk. And the napkin unfolds the whole sea dazzling like the feathers of a peacock43. These allegorical transformations that invade actual and past time challenge the knowing reader to decode them: Balbec was the place where 'Marcel' meets Albertine, and so receives an erotic form, and the peacock indicates the fascination for the Guermantes often associated with birds. The transcendental character of reading presupposes the process of reading and also recognizing these different elements woven together in the resurrection. So Time is inserted in the time of reading, and gains a medium in the reading-process.

More on this is posted in the Dec 15 thread.