Week ending 12/13: Time Regained, to location 55133

[Renato]

Use this topic thread for all Time Regained discussions through location 55133.

Stop at paragraph beginning "My conversation with Gilberte was interrupted by the voice of the actress which now made itself heard."

[Sunny]

The closure of la Berma... heartbreaking.

[Renato]

Ugh, it was truly heartbreaking, Sunny... especially seeing that personal side of her, and how devoted she was to her ungrateful daughter! I was so mad.

And we keep witnessing more and more changes. I couldn't believe when the narrator told us that Mme. Verdurin became the Princesse de Guermantes!!! LOL at this!

And Rachel now being famous and friends with Oriane... who now doesn't have that important reputation anymore... and how people completely remembers wrong about Swann, Tansonville..

More and more it seems that the message being conveyed here is that the memory that truly counts is the one within ourselves / own our memories... what people think and remember of us has nothing to do with reality.

[Renato]

The narrator briefly mentioned Mme. Putbus' maid in this section and I got to thinking: along with Lea, these two are important characters that were only talked about... never appeared... well, Lea was seen by the narrator once... but even so..

[Renato]

I have been reading all of this time, since I started, expecting it to end, to conquer this literary accomplishment... but now that I'm so close - should finish it tonight -, it feels like saying goodbye and losing something. It's been a great, great year!

[Renato]

Exactly! The good thing is that we can still revisit that friend anytime. :-)

[Jonathan]

If the narrator was getting confused over the ageing of the others then this reader was getting confused, sometimes, over who exactly was who. Of course, I knew that Mme Verdurin was now a Guermantes but when the narrator mentioned that the Duchess Guermantes was talking to Rachel I though that that was Mme Verdurin, but of course this was Oriane and Mme Verdurin was now Princess de Guermantes. Also when the narrator mentioned Mme de Forcheville I had to check; does he mean Odette?

I think this confusion over all these people that we feel helps us to experience the confusion that the narrator is having.

[Jonathan]

Both we and the author are experiencing a lot of changes but it is still shocking to hear that the narrator now finds Odette's company dull and boring and we get a glimpse into the future when she is considered a bit gaga!

[Dave]

Jonathan, I also found it confusing trying to sort out who was whoat the Matinee. Seeing you set out Odette as you did made me think that her social oblivion matched that of Swann