Marcel Proust and Swann's Way

This summer I started an attempt on a reading project for myself and read Marcel Proust's famous In Search of Lost Time, the six volume novel of gigantic proportions.  I had taken interest in this series because I had already owned the first volume and decided to get the other six for my collection (all of them match by the way).  I also decided to read this because a friend had suggested them and has my same tastes for literary and classic fiction.  I have had them on my shelf for a while and when I finally finished Tropic of Cancer and some light reads, I wanted to take on something ambitious.  Thus, I gave myself a project and a goal: to read this six part novel in six months.

Unfortunately, this goal has changed immensely.  Here are the reasons why:
1) This is not a light read novel.  In fact, a few times I had to go back to try to understand what M. Proust was saying when my mind wandered off the page to images that captured my mind. 
2) Because of this, it took me six whole weeks to finish this volume alone.  Again my mind would wander around after a bit of seeing images in my mind. 
3) Other books had captured my interest as well that were a bit more lighter than this volume. 
4) There were some parts of the novel I found depressing like the narrator himself, his aunt, and I couldn't stand the city bourgeois gossip about how M. Swann made an unfavorable marriage to Mlle. Odette de Crecy.  Though the steamy parts and their courtship and jealousy got my wheel turning the pages faster. 
5) Stream of consciousness is a great plot narrative device.  However, it is one I can sometimes end up completely lost and have to turn back in a few times until I can grasp the story.  I had this same trouble with Virginia Woolf one year for upper-division British Novel class.  I still do not remember the plot of the story. 

Nevertheless, I do think the writing is excellent and Proust can weave a great story, though I think some of it is a bit redundant and lengthy to find yourself wondering, when do we get to something really spicy or funny or page-turning?  When are you going to be done, Proust, explaining Swann's past or Swann's jealousy or your troubles with mummy to get to a really good subplot that we want to read, like Swann and Odette's love making? 

Like I said excellent writing, but too lengthy to want to start the next volume so soon.  I think I will read something a bit lighter for a while until I feel ready for Within a Budding Grove. 

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Atonement by Ian McEwan

Note: This was from my previous blog written in 2009, hope you enjoy!!! My friends and I, even after two months of finishing this book, are still discussing this great novel: Atonement, by Ian McEwan. I mean, usually when we have read a book, we only discuss it for one day, two to three days tops, but for Atonement--almost two months. I won't give away the plot for those who have not read the novel--however, part of our debate has been on the plot and some of the subplots and of the character Briony, herself. Was Briony mistaken or was she lying when she saw Robbie and Cecilia together in the library? Was she driven by jealousy or naivety of what she saw? When did she start to feel guilty after making false witness to the police? If she had not noticed them by the fountain the first time, what would she have thought when she saw the pair in the library, and would her statement to the police be different? Then we go on to the other characters: Paul Marshall, ...
Read more

Junot Diaz and His Use of Language

This is an assignment I just completed for my Latin American Literature class and felt this was a good topic to put up here.  Enjoy!!! When reading Junot Diaz's, “The Pura Principle”, I was noticing that Diaz went back and forth writing in English and then using Spanish phrases to capture the authenticity of the story. I say authenticity because most households that speak both English and Spanish speak with a hybrid of both languages. Though this was never practiced in my immediate family, my father's cousins' families did use a hybrid of both English and Spanish when speaking because they grew up learning both Spanish and English. It was more dominant when expressing emotions. Only my father and his siblings were able to keep up with their cousins in the interchanging of languages. Like his story, in the interview, Diaz switches back from Spanish to English on occasion. This is because this is authentic for him as he is familiar with both languages due to “...
Read more

Communication: What Happens When I Cannot Get Though

I have been contemplating something for weeks that has been bothering me since it happened.  Along with that, I am still bothered by the attitudes surrounding it.  After many weeks, I am still at the same conclusion; not only that I am still baffled by why others would not agree with my conclusion.  A few weeks ago, I was moving my things from my apartment to a storage area and was scrambling to find people to help.  I was in a bind because I had to be out by a certain date and my landlord had already made arrangements for another tenant to move in.  (Along with that I could not afford the increase in rent which would have gone from $1050 to $1395.  I don't have it).  I originally called a moving company to see if they could do the job, however every weekend until my move out date was booked and a weekday would not work for me because I couldn't get the time off.  I did manage to get two people to help me, a old colleague and his friend/roo...
Read more