Psycho Proustians discussion
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Swann’s Way
SWANN'S WAY 2021
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Combray, section II (Discussion thread 2)
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Jan wrote: "it's kind of counterintuitive to refer to a closeted life as a "gay lifestyle." Wasn't it the behavior that was considered reprehensible, not a state of being or way of life (as we would think more recently)?..."Jan, I don't remember bringing up gay 'lifestyle' except in response to your mention of it above? Would you mind reminding me of where I mentioned "lifestyle"?
...but even though I didn't originally mention the word "lifestyle", after you brought up the word, I assumed you meant the word lifestyle as in referring to a way of life? If you're living half or most of your life in secret and as a lie, isn't that a part of your lifestyle? That is what I thought you were referring to when you brought up the term "gay lifestyle".
It appears that is not quite what you meant. I looked it up and it seems you first mention it in your post 37, saying: "As to his being gay, I am in doubt that would have been conceived of as a lifestyle, as it has come to be. I'm not even sure he'd have been thought of as a gay Jew as would be common in more recent times."
You are right, as I mentioned in a previous post trying to explain where I was coming from, that indeed, because Proust went to great lengths to try and hide the fact that he was gay, he would probably not have been thought of as gay by society in general, but only because he was hiding the fact, and he was hiding it for the very reason that he feared the societal consequences should it become widely known, because it was seen as so aberrant that even thinking gay thoughts was a thing that was frowned upon.
I don't think I ever implied that being gay would necessarily be conceived of as a lifestyle. All I think that I said on the matter was, as you cite there, the fact that Proust was gay and that he was Jewish, therefore, a gay Jew. Sexual orientation implies only that: - orientation. Orientation by itself doesn't imply lifestyle, since as far as I know, the word "lifestyle" has to do with personal choices and decisions. I was talking about reasons why Proust would have felt such a great need to fit in with high society, which is something you see when you read a bit about his life - and why it's important to the text for me, is that Proust's narrator also exhibits a need to be accepted.
Proust's homosexuality isn't really as much applicable to the text yet, as it will be later on, so perhaps we should discuss it and Proust's (Proust the writer's as then also reflected in the narrator's) obvious desire to fit in socially, later on. I have other thoughts as well, why Proust would have perhaps had self-image problems, and that would be to do with the fact that he was seen as 'sickly' and book-ish child. His health never really improved, so this must always have been an albatross hanging around his neck.
As for the Jewishness, that came into play in our text when the narrator tells us about the grandfather acting in an anti-Semitic way, so it's fine to bring in extra-textual sources in that regard.
Much has been written about Proust's efforts to expunge his Jewish background completely from Recherche - the narrator is definitely not Jewish. I'll try to look for sources in this regard when I'm feeling better, but you can google it in the meantime, if you like. I think it was also discussed in the article that Nick and Stephen linked to.
What I was talking about regarding matrilineal descent of Jews, you can read about here:
https://www.chabad.org/library/articl...
and here:
https://www.myjewishlearning.com/arti...
and here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Matrili...
I love American Pastoral. :(No worries Jan, many think highly of it. Around the same time earlier this year I read Goodbye, Columbus and was impressed enough to give Roth another shot. Ugh, but then American Pastoral reminded me of everything that drives me nuts about him. Feel free to come at me hard if you wish to take it to the mats, I'd certainly be game :)
Some quotes from Proust's letters to help tie up some of our comments from the threads so far. Proust to Robert de Montesquiou [before September 26, 1905] at the time of his mother dying:
"...(and I can't tell you how this word 'hope' thrills me; it seems to restore the possibility of my continuing to live), from the depths where we were, the ascent returning will nevertheless be so gradual that each day's progress, if God is willing for it to continue, will be imperceptible. Since you are kind enough to be concerned about my anxiety, I shall write you if there is any decisive improvement to deliver us from our torment. But don't take the trouble to send [for news]. I can't tell you what I have suffered. You don't know Mother. Her extraordinary modesty hides from almost everyone her extraordinary distinction. And in front of people she admires -and you she admires infinitely - this excessive modesty becomes a complete disguise, with the result that, except for a few friends, I am almost the only one who knows how incomparable she is. As for the uninterrupted sacrifice that her life has been, it is the most moving thing in the world. She knows I am so incapable of living without her; so vulnerable in every way of life, that if, as I fear and dread, she has the feeling that perhaps she is going to leave me forever, she must have known cruel and anxious moments, which are a most horrible torture for me to picture..."
After she has died at 56, to the Comtesse de Noailles, September 27, 1905:
"...She takes my life with her, as Father took hers with him. She wanted to stay alive after him for us, but she couldn't. Since when she married Father, she did not change from the Jewish religion, because in it she saw a refinement of respect for her parents, there will be no church service, only at the house at high noon tomorrow..."
Stephen wrote: "For instance, with the Tablet article, the author discusses the "de-Judaization" Proust did to his novel. It goes into the strategies Proust used to efface his very own Jewishness. If so, that might explain why we're both unsure of whether the maman we've read in the novel so far is actually Jewish like Proust's mother was (I for one had just assumed it)."...and that is exactly the risk you run when you don't do a "close reading" of a text first before doing any background reading. I am now for the first time seeing the value of what the exponents of New Criticism is talking about. Maybe I had never really seen the value of it before, because it's been drilled into my head so many times that "In a First-person narration, the author is NOT the narrator.'
But I am starting to understand now why, also, so many people hated the novel Lolita . It's because most people haven't had it drilled into their heads over and over again that the narrator is NOT the author, and so they tend to conflate the narrator's values with that of the author's. :)
...and I can very well see why it is a huge temptation in Proust to conflate the author and the narrator, - even when you know that the work is not an autobiography: It's because so many little details that Proust puts in ARE autobiographical.
...but in a sense, doesn't every author put in aspects of what he or she has experienced in their own lives?
Stephen wrote: "" Here was Manet, I hoped, with a pen. ..."So far, I have been seeing Monet: :)
Stephen wrote: (the part about Roth trying to do in American Pastoral what Proust did for French or France...and is incredibly clumsy at it -- sorry for my paraphrase!)then Jan wrote, "I love American Pastoral. :( "
And Stephen wrote, "No worries Jan, many think highly of it. Around the same time earlier this year I read Goodbye, Columbus and was impressed enough to give Roth another shot. Ugh, but t..."
Thanks for your non-defensive reply, Stephen. Very much appreciated! 🙂
Not going to "come at you hard" -- too time consuming, boring, and prone to confirmation bias!
Would just prefer if you didn't like Roth as opposed to making a pronouncement. Everyone can have an opinion, but with accepted authors it's like those ganging up on Lolita, or like the person who goes to a museum of modern art and saying his three-year-old could do that. Maybe there could be something there? and he's just not for you?
Maybe your generation, whatever it is. I've read six or seven; American Pastoral is best. I never thought about his trying to do that for America, but there's an essay in the current Jewish Review of books on him and his biographer that does refer to that -- wouldn't have noticed if not for this discussion, so thanks.
As to what I got out of it, and it's a lot, you could look at my review if you want to.
In thinking about this comment I went to your profile page. Doesn't say too much about you so I looked at your books. Of our books, we overlap on only three, not so unusual since there are SO MANY BOOKS, and you don't have that many listed, but on those three we have a high degree of agreement. So we're not on entirely different planets or something!
Happy reading,
Jan
Stephen wrote: "Traveller, I don't know if you've come across it yet, but someone has written a book called Proust Was A Neuroscientist. Subsequent to this book, which was a big success, the author, Jonah Lehrer, ..."I'm planning to read Proust Was a Neuroscientist later this summer, not because I think he literally might have been but because Proust seems to have had so many insights intuitively that might yet be scientifically proven to be at least sort of accurate, and that always delights me. Certainly, of our great fiction writers, he seems to have thought the most about thinking, about how memory works, and how people's different selves are never as hidden, or as well displayed, as we think they are.
Kate wrote: "...of our great fiction writers, he seems to have thought the most about thinking,..." Hmmm, for me, as far as the 'thinking' goes, that probably depends, I would think, on who and what you included as thinking, and as "fiction", but about memory, most certainly agreed. :) Kate wrote: "..how people's different selves are never as hidden, or as well displayed, as we think they are. "
There's a lot in what you said there - very sharp and interesting comment. I find myself turning that around and around in my mind, thanks for that!
What's really impressed me so far is his minute observations on the hypnogogic state. Just finished Combray and the bit at the end about how he imagines his dark room from behind closed eyes versus how things are actually revealed to be situated when the light returns felt more familiar than any prose I've read in years.
Also, wee Proust is a merciless little observer of his elders. I laughed out loud at his older female relatives' versions of thanking Swann for the Asti he brought. Heaven forbid they actually mention what he actually did, or that they actually express gratitude. XDThis is as much a story of failures to develop object permanence and actual recognition of other human beings as having interior lives, as anything else so far.
Kate wrote: "What's really impressed me so far is his minute observations on the hypnogogic state. Just finished Combray and the bit at the end about how he imagines his dark room from behind closed eyes versus..."When you get to the end of Combray, it's almost as if he dreamed the whole thing inbetween the "false" dawn he mentioned at the beginning, and the "actual dawn" that he mentions at the end.
Kate wrote: "Also, wee Proust is a merciless little observer of his elders. I laughed out loud at his older female relatives' versions of thanking Swann for the Asti he brought. Heaven forbid they actually ment..."
...well, the narrator of course, since it's not an autobiography, (I think the narrator's family name is mentioned somewhere, but it's hardly ever uttered) but yes, indeed, quite a few humorous fun-pokings there.
I'll have more time tomorrow, when I'd like to chat along with you re your other interesting observations.
Btw, I'm sure you've also noticed how very sense-oriented the narrator is, and how he tends to mix the qualities of the sight, sound, dimensions etc of objects, almost as if he had synesthesia.
Synesthesia is exactly what I was thinking of!
Stephen wrote: "Jan, and others interested in Proust's Jewishness in relation to the work, almost as if the gods answered our prayers, the Jewish magazine Tablet just dropped an outstanding article addressing the ..."Thanks, Stephen. Just got around to reading that Tablet article. 🙂 Very useful!
Traveller wrote: "...What I was talking about regarding matrilineal descent of Jews, you can read about here: ... and here ...
and here."
Traveller, thanks for the instruction.
But you miss my point.
Jan wrote: "Traveller wrote: "...What I was talking about regarding matrilineal descent of Jews, you can read about here: ... and here ...
and here."
Traveller, thanks for the instruction.
But you miss my p..."
It does seem as if we are out of step with each other's point of view. Perhaps we should explain ourselves regarding the original point that we were trying to make.
Why I responded to your comments, was that it felt to me as if you were commenting on my initial point about Proust's obvious insecurity and his gargantuan efforts to try and hide the fact that he was gay and Jewish. So my observation was simply that, as shown in his writing, Proust must have felt to some extent an outsider where it came to being fully accepted in certain circles of society, and he clearly went to a great deal of trouble in order to be "the life of the party", as per biographical material about him.
For me, this sort of comes through into his writing, in how insecure his narrator (and even Swann) seems to feel in a variety of instances.
You then started a conversation about "gay lifestyle" and referenced my comment about Proust's homosexual orientation. I am still racking my brain as to exactly what you mean by this. I tried to get help from the internet, but it seems as if "gay lifestyle" is regarded as an offensive term by gay people. See: https://simmalieberman.com/what-is-th... and http://www.schools-out.org.uk/?news=w... and https://www.d.umn.edu/~hrallis/profes...
I know a few gay people, and as far as I can see, they quietly live with their same-sex partners in very similar ways that heterosexual people do.
I know another one (a gay man) who is rather promiscuous and flits from partner to partner - is that perhaps what you mean by "gay lifestyle"? ...since there is a myth out there that gay people are inherently promiscuous? Yet there are as many straight people out there who are also promiscuous. Once again, I am simply trying to guess what you mean by :"gay lifestyle" since you have not spelled it out. Perhaps you are referring to the gay subculture that exists, including for example, transvestites and so on? Gay clubs and so on? But as I mentioned, these gay clubs existed in Proust's time as well, and he did frequent them. You seem to be trying to make a distinction between then and now. Are you perhaps referring to the fact that homosexuality is more accepted these days and that in many countries, gay people are allowed to marry one another?
Also not sure why Prousts' Jewish descent is a bone of contention?
I am not trying to be difficult here, I'm just trying to understand.
Traveller wrote: "...What I was talking about regarding matrilineal descent of Jews, you can read about here: ...and here ...
and here." ...
Traveller, thanks for the instruction.
But you miss my point." ...
Also not sure why Prousts' Jewish descent is a bone of contention?
I am not trying to be difficult here, I'm just trying to understand.
Thanks for asking, Traveller.
My point doesn't have to do with his Jewish descent but rather that people who are not Jews don't follow Jewish law to justify their attitudes or behavior, that is, they don't give a fig about which parent is Jewish. Thus my example in the last paragraph of comment No. 48.
Does that help?
...also, to continue a little further regarding my comments w/Stephen re Proust's psychoanalytic-like free associative method (to an extent), there could have been those negatively inclined toward his work even had neither of his parents been Jews, if they linked him to "the Jewish science" i.e., psychoanalysis. Speculative comment as I don't know if that indeed happened. If his work was highly regarded across the board from the very first, then maybe detractors in that vein would have been cowed into silence.
Jan wrote: "My point doesn't have to do with his Jewish descent but rather that people who are not Jews don't follow Jewish law to justify their attitudes or behavior, that is, they don't give a fig about which parent is Jewish...."Thanks for the clarification, Jan. You are right on that, I guess.
But in any case, I was more focused on Proust's self-perception. He would have realized at some point that he could be considered Jewish, and probably saw Jewish people being teased or bullied, and hence his fear that his descent could prove to be a societal stumbling block.
To be fair, I think that some of the initial skepticism of Proust's abilities as a writer, also came from the fact that he was seen as too much of a society fop to write anything of serious import.
Psycho Proustians
Books mentioned in this topic
Lolita (other topics)On Reading (other topics)
Sur la lecture (other topics)
Geneviève Straus: Trilogie d'une égérie (Collection "Biographies") (other topics)
Geneviève Straus Biographie et correspondance (other topics)
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Ugh, my symptoms started kicking in exactly 22 hours after the vaccination, but I've medicated myself enough now to come and type. :)
Fio, I also remember this piece standing out for me, especially the play of the moonlight, so thanks for 'illuminating' the piece for us with that image of a Hubert painting.
As far as the translations go, Davis's is extremely prosaic, and in this case I far prefer the Enright:
"We would return by the Boulevard de la Gare, which contained the most attractive villas in the town. In each of their gardens the moonlight, copying the art of Hubert Robert, scattered its broken staircases of white marble, its fountains, its iron gates temptingly ajar. Its beams had swept away the telegraph office. All that was left of it was a column, half shattered but preserving the beauty of a ruin which endures for all time. I would by now be dragging my weary limbs and ready to drop with sleep; the balmy scent of the lime-trees seemed a reward that could be won only at the price of great fatigue and was not worth the effort. From gates far apart the watchdogs, awakened by our steps in the silence, would set up an antiphonal barking such as I still hear at times of an evening, and among which the Boulevard de la Gare (when the public gardens of Combray were constructed on its site) must have taken refuge, for wherever I may be, as soon as they begin their alternate challenge and response, I can see it again with its lime-trees, and its pavement glistening beneath the moon. "
I just didn't see where he got the "antiphonal" from in the French, but I suppose it's implied by the to-and-fro barking and adds to the atmosphere. :)