The Way by Swann's (In Search of Lost Time, Volume 1) (Vol 1)
3 journalers for this copy...
I'm gradually releasing a pile of unwanted books I was given. This is one of them. Off it goes into the world!
Its always difficult to rate one of the classic works of literature, let alone one where the story continues over several more books. The depth of description makes this a classic, but also not a book to read if you like fast paced action. I was surprised at times by the level of humour in the writing also.
Journal Entry 3 by BookGroupMan at York, North Yorkshire United Kingdom on Wednesday, March 14, 2018
This book - or rather the complete 'In search of lost time' - has passed through my hands unread before. The serendipity of finding this on the Brigantes shelf is maybe a push I need to pick it up again. And maybe after that I could try to finish Ulysses!
(28/07/23) In Search of Lost Time (previously translated as, ‘Remembrance of Things Past’)
After a false start many years ago after I picked this up in York (30+ pages) I have finally properly started this epic, or should I say reached the end of the beginning, part 1 of volume 1, The Way by Swann’s. To put this into perspective, there are 7 volumes, 3,000 pages and 1 million words!
This first part includes the famous passage about eating madeleine’s dipped in tea that invokes a dreamlike reverie of Proust’s [fictionalised] childhood visits to family in Combray (Illiers, near Chartres). The book starts with a memory of waking up in different bedrooms, after sleep-interrupted nights, and a particular event when he is desperate for a goodnight kiss from his mother. Swann himself only makes a smallish tangential role, as does his daughter Gilberte, Proust's early love interest; not coincidentally on the walk Proust (his alter ego) referred to as "The Way by Swann's". I will write more later about Proust's nature, his relationship with his mother and the context, including his 'Jewishness' and life in Paris during the belle epoque. I hope to move on to the next chapter/part soon ... !
The majority of the book - I’m calling it a book at 180+ pages - is nostalgia for the people, places, objects and feelings for the town. There is no plot as such, and the detailed memories and stream-of-consciousness style that Proust invented, or at least was the earliest famous exponent, doesn't provide a coherent narrative, but it does have some momentum, if not direction; the unique style and rhythm if you stick with it, as a fan of James Joyce and Virginia Woolf, I am almost duty-bound to like, but that doesn’t mean that it isn’t challenging.
Ps. yes the above paragraph is my attempt at a Proustian sentence!
Pps. in the intermediate years I have now read Ulysses
(28/07/23) In Search of Lost Time (previously translated as, ‘Remembrance of Things Past’)
After a false start many years ago after I picked this up in York (30+ pages) I have finally properly started this epic, or should I say reached the end of the beginning, part 1 of volume 1, The Way by Swann’s. To put this into perspective, there are 7 volumes, 3,000 pages and 1 million words!
This first part includes the famous passage about eating madeleine’s dipped in tea that invokes a dreamlike reverie of Proust’s [fictionalised] childhood visits to family in Combray (Illiers, near Chartres). The book starts with a memory of waking up in different bedrooms, after sleep-interrupted nights, and a particular event when he is desperate for a goodnight kiss from his mother. Swann himself only makes a smallish tangential role, as does his daughter Gilberte, Proust's early love interest; not coincidentally on the walk Proust (his alter ego) referred to as "The Way by Swann's". I will write more later about Proust's nature, his relationship with his mother and the context, including his 'Jewishness' and life in Paris during the belle epoque. I hope to move on to the next chapter/part soon ... !
The majority of the book - I’m calling it a book at 180+ pages - is nostalgia for the people, places, objects and feelings for the town. There is no plot as such, and the detailed memories and stream-of-consciousness style that Proust invented, or at least was the earliest famous exponent, doesn't provide a coherent narrative, but it does have some momentum, if not direction; the unique style and rhythm if you stick with it, as a fan of James Joyce and Virginia Woolf, I am almost duty-bound to like, but that doesn’t mean that it isn’t challenging.
Ps. yes the above paragraph is my attempt at a Proustian sentence!
Pps. in the intermediate years I have now read Ulysses
