Reading Proust's In Search of Lost Time in 2014 discussion
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La Prisonnière
The Captive & The Fugitive
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Week ending 10/11: The Captive, finish
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Dave
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Oct 04, 2014 06:36AM
Hee, hee, it will be interesting to see whether you get you get your copy from the library's "offsite" before I get my copy shipped from Australia.
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Dave wrote: "I have to say I am beginning to be excited at the prospect of you folks finishing the book so we can can consider all aspects of the novel without consideration of spoilers. ..."And I'm convinced such an experience depends on total surprise when Proust pulls the rabbit out of the hat after finishing. ..."
Dave, I have never heard anyone refer to the ending as you just did, but that is exactly how I felt. Surprised, shocked and amazed at his brilliance in weaving his "tapestry," with all those threads...through 3000 pages. And, not unlike Scheherazade.
I want to add something, but dare not. I just hope to remember...to return to this thought later. Mind trigger clue: darkness.
Renato wrote: "Dave wrote: "Ironically, I liked this volume because ..."I really really enjoyed this volume."
Renato, that is wonderful to read! The Captive is my favorite volume.
I wept, when I first read of Bergotte's death.
Then, there is the Vinteuil/music meditation and the Verdurin drama.
Plus, the Venice/Fortuny passage, which echoes back to WBG and Elstir. (Proust wrote Reynaldo Hahn's sister, Maria, requesting information on the designs; she was related through marriage to Fortuny.)
Fortuny was also influenced by Wagner...like Proust. Here is a detailed article by P. Segal (creator of Proust Said That)
"In 1916 Proust, forever obsessed with detail, wrote to Maria from the Boulevard Haussman with a series of questions: "Do you know, at least, whether Fortuny has ever used as a decoration for his dressing gowns those pairs of birds, drinking in a vase, for example, which appear so frequently in St. Marks on Byzantine capitals? And do you know if in Venice there are any paintings (I would like some titles) in which any mantles or dresses appear that Fortuny may have (or could have) gained inspiration from?" Maria having replied affirmatively, Proust could write with confidence that Albertine's dress, a gift from the narrator, "swarmed with Arabic ornaments, like the Venetian palaces hidden like sultanas behind a screen of pierced stone, like the bindings in the Ambrosian library, like the columns from which the Oriental birds that symbolized alternatively life and death were repeated in the mirror of the fabric."
http://zacker.info/pst/fortuny.html
Mod
I wept, when I first read of Bergotte's death.
Then, there is the Vinteuil/music meditation and the Verdurin drama."
Marcelita, I really loved this volume! I'm glad to know it's your favorite.
Bergotte's death was emotional for me as well. Just to think of it I get chills to be honest.
What was the scene you mentioned that was your favorite from this volume?
Renato wrote: "Marcelita wrote: "Renato, that is wonderful to read! The Captive is my favorite volume. What was the scene you mentioned that was your favorite from this volume?"
Just thinking back on so many scenes that answered some lingering questions.
I remember being shocked at Swann's death, delivered when I was not prepared.
Swann’s death had deeply distressed me at the time. Swann’s death!
We learn with deep regret that M. Charles Swann passed away yesterday at his residence in Paris after a long and painful illness.
And yet, my dear Charles Swann, whom I used to know when I was still so young and you were nearing your grave, it is because he whom you must have regarded as a young idiot has made you the hero of one of his novels that people are beginning to speak of you again and that your name will perhaps live. If, in Tissot’s picture... MP
And then...realizing that the Vinteuil heroine-composer was "the friend!" The heroine without a name. Isn't it strange that a genius could be so unknown? So discounted?
The concert began; I did not know what was being played; I found myself in a strange land. Where was I to place it? Who was the composer? I longed to know, and, seeing nobody near me whom I could ask, I should have liked to be a character in those Arabian Nights which I never tired of reading and in which, in moments of uncertainty, there appears a genie, or a maiden of ravishing beauty, invisible to everyone else but not to the perplexed hero to whom she reveals exactly what he wishes to learn.
...with the object of erecting a statue to Vinteuil. Moreover, these works had been assisted, no less than by Mlle Vinteuil’s relations with her friend... MP
And also realizing that most of the story of "Swann in Love" must have told to the narrator by Charlus, while being amazed at the detail of Odette's previous marriage.
"But really you mustn’t start making me tell you Swann’s story, or we should be here all night—nobody knows more about it than I do.
"It was I who used to take Odette out when she didn’t want to see Charles. It was all the more awkward for me as I have a very close kinsman who bears the name Crécy, without of course having any sort of right to it, but still he was none too well pleased. For she went by the name of Odette de Crécy, as she perfectly well could, being merely separated from a Crécy whose wife she still was—an extremely authentic one, he, a most estimable gentleman out of whom she had drained his last farthing." MP
But, my favorite scene which revealed such cruelty and manipulation, ended with a surprising, "Touché!" Bittersweet...with a touch of history.
"I don’t know what you can have said to him,” said Ski. “He looked quite upset; there were tears in his eyes" ...
"You don’t look at all well, my dear cousin,” she (Queen of Naples) said to to M. de Charlus. “Lean on my arm. You may be sure that it will always support you. It is strong enough for that.” Then, raising her eyes proudly in front of her (where, Ski later told me, Mme Verdurin and Morel were standing): "You know how in the past, at Gaeta, it held the mob at bay. It will be a shield to you." And it will be a shield to you." And it was thus, taking the Baron on her arm and without having allowed Morel to be presented to her, that the glorious sister of the Empress Elisabeth left the house. MP
I don't think I have much to contribute to this discussion. I've had basically the same reaction as most of you.This may be my favorite volume. Although the other volumes are just as beautifully written, The Captive had way more tension - was way more plot driven, almost - than the other volumes. The entirety of chapter 2, during the Verdurin gathering with de Charlus infuriating Mme. Verdurin more and more as the evening went on, was practically unputdownable for me. And the climactic exit of de Charlus on the arm of the Queen of Naples was positively exhilarating!
I enjoyed reading about the mind games that the narrator and Albertine played with each other. Who among us has not at some point or other tried to guess the hidden agenda of some person and modified our actions or our words - to the opposite of our own inclinations - simply to outmaneuver a perceived slight? I grew weary of the narrator's charade (as if someone as sensitive as our narrator could possibly care so little about any relationship, much less one in which he has such a vested interest) and I found myself feeling a bit sorry for Albertine.
I am moving right into the next volume, because I absolutely adored the part of Swann chasing Odette around town in the first volume (remember the part when he surprised that couple as he thought he was peering into Odette's window?) and with all of the similarities between Swann/Odette and our narrator/Albertine, I am hopeful that Proust is gearing up to give me another ride along the same river.
Only two weeks behind the group now, so I hope to catch up to everyone soon!
Mod
Yes, I wondered what that was that I could see over my shoulder...it was Sunny rapidly approaching.
I'm glad you liked The Captive as well. I'm finding The Fugitive a bit more hard work in places. Proust's style seems 'fresher' with these two volumes.
Thank you Sunny for your interesting thoughts. It is always fun to read what interests other readers.Your phrase "ride along the same river" gave me an involuntary memory of the Jungle Boat Ride in Adventure Land at Disney World! Yes, its a Small World and Proust is Mickey Mouse Welcoming me to his Magic Kingdom! lol
The Sun is rising behind us so we must be going West!
@ Jonathan: Uh-oh! I hope I don't find it sloggish as I did with volume 3...@Dave: HAHAHAHA! 'going west' - :) Cute.
The Sun Also Rises....I can lob puns over the net all day. :)
Marcelita wrote: "Dave wrote: "- So who is the Captive? For most of the volume I was convinced it was the narrator, captive of his own obsession. But by the end I had identified some other captives: Charlus- captiv..."Ooooooh how I can't wait until next year when I can delve into Proustian criticism! :D I can't wait to come back to your recommendations, Marcelita.
potential spoiler for ending of The CaptiveI've just finished The Captive and the ending of the volume made me think that Proust has done such an impeccable job of creating this life experience for us. Everything happens exactly like you expect it to, but there's still somehow an element of surprise. For example, the last chapter is called "Flight of Albertine," so it's pretty darned obvious what's going to happen. But then in the last few sentences there's turnabout and then another turnabout.
A great moment for me is when the narrator compares the sound of the airplane to the sound of the train -- and that took me back all the way to page two of volume one for me when he first mentions the sound of a train whistle. The explicit mention and grouping together of the experiences of the hawthorns, the madeleine, etc. ... divine. That's one of my favorite things. I loved the very first description of falling asleep and the questions and theories it raises, and I'm loving the return to that motif in this volume! On to The Fugitive.
Mod
Dwayne wrote: "potential spoiler for ending of The CaptiveI've just finished The Captive and the ending of the volume made me think that Proust has done such an impeccable job of creating this life experience ...
A great moment for me is when the narrator compares the sound of the airplane to the sound of the train -- and that took me back all the way to page two of volume one for me when he first mentions the sound of a train whistle"
Dwayne, you are a close-reader; the train whistle is the first sound in the novel. One of my teachers has the group re-read the Overture, after each volume.
I always think of Transonville, as I read those opening pages.
