The Guermantes way | 
pickThis volume is extreme with how many characters there are…. I remember the first time I read this (yeah I‘ve read it twice!) I had to start over because I wasn‘t keeping close enough track of everyone. This time I avoided that, but it required taking meticulous notes on a note that crashed my Evernote so I had to start another.
Overwhelming stuff. It‘s a beautiful book though. I guess I‘m halfway through—pretty sure I haven‘t read book four.
Coming up on the end of this volume (and excited about it!), I can smell it, at which point, being honest, I will most likely just dive into the fourth one, continuing this seemingly endless endeavor….
Was it really for dinner parties like the present one that all these people dressed up and refused middle-class women admittance to their exclusive drawing rooms? For dinner parties like this, which would have been no different even in my absence? For a second I suspected as much, but the suspicion was too absurd.
I can‘t tell you how tiresome he was. He would be no more stupid than anyone else if he only had the good sense, like many people of our acquaintance, to remain a fool. It‘s that intellectual facade of his that gets in the way.
I knew that in the long course of the centuries it was not only with the works of different artists but actually with the various works of one artist that critics had enjoyed pushing back into the shade what for too long had been radiant, and bringing into the light what had seemed doomed to permanent obscurity.
it occurred to me that our social life, like an artist‘s studio, is filled with abandoned sketches depicting our momentary attempts to capture our need for a great love, but what did not occur to me was that sometimes, if the sketch is not too old, we may return to it and transform it into a completely different work, possibly more important than the one we had originally planned.
pickVolume 3 of In Search of Lost Time is ✅ This might be my least favorite volume so far. Set mostly in Paris, our narrator moves into society and we start to see what the mucky mucks are about. Lots of tracing of lineages and "witty" conversations. Also lots of annoying remakes about women & girls. ? Still Proust is a master. When he describes a colour, a scene from a window, an emotion it is worth slogging through some aristocratic namedropping.
There was nothing delightful about the days preceding my dinner engagement with Mme de Stermaria; I found them unbearable. For, as a general rule, the shorter the time that separates us from the project we have in mind, the longer it seems, because we measure it on a more reduced scale, or simply because of the fact that we even bother to measure it.
Awww….I‘m back to Proust, which has spoiled me, it‘s reading at its finest. On every page, I find that one profound statement (midst all the other wonderful prose) which takes my breath away. I‘m thinking: “I can‘t believe he just said that.” For me: “Jane Austen, you‘re great, but not even close to this level.
She was plainly aware that I must regard her as a mediocre actress and, conversely, hold in high esteem the ones she despised. But she showed no resentment, because in all great talent that is not yet recognized, as hers was not at the time, however selfconfident it may be, there is an element of humility, and because we calculate the amount of esteem we expect from others in terms not of our latent potential but of our present achievements.
pick“They nod to you, you glance at the door.
They drop a card, you go to luncheon.
That‘s THE GUERMANTES WAY.
And that‘s how you impress the Duchess!”
I had to take a week off from Proust due to time constraints, but I‘m back into him now with Daisy‘s help. She‘s a great reading buddy, though her haunted house is very cold and its mice have multiplied.
Cooper believes in maintaining his dignity at all times. He‘d do well in late 19th century French society.
In between weird naps and demands for outdoor time, he‘s helping me continue my glorious journey through Proust. Once again, I‘ve gotta post under a different edition than the one I‘m reading, but this time it‘s because Litsy throws a fit and boots me out when I try to use the correct one. Most peculiar.
pickVolume 3 completed and what a ride- beginning at the opera- a satire of society, our narrator begins his education- stumbling along the way with his naive misunderstandings of the ways “society” works and he moves from infatuation of the grand families to a dawning understanding of their petty cruelties- ending as the Duchesse de Guermantes leaves Swann standing to attend a party after he tells her he is dying. On to V.4 #Proust2020
rubyslippersreads, KarouBlue, Palimpsest, Lcsmcat, sisilia, TheBookHippie, LeahBergen, catiewithac, Centique, Bklover, vivastory, arubabookwoman, jewright
Got my tea, my guitar, and my Proust. Shaping up to be a good Sunday. 📖🤓❤️
Chocolate chip instead of madeleines but one does what one must when reading Proust...
Seriously Moncrieff (top book)? “Moment of gratification?” This is why translation fascinates and often baffles me. You made me spend $25 to order the French version so I can see for myself what Proust actually wrote. I think I‘ll try Moncrieff‘s non-sequitur out on my lover next time and see how it flys. 🤤
...and on to the third volume of these new translations. Good to get back to Proust.
pickSomething clicked for me with these books—clicked in the way that feels special—and now I totally GET Proust. This work speaks to me, and I‘m relishing every page of this reading experience.
What really helped was when I started making comparisons, considering this in the same respect that I think of contemporary American society. What it does is it explores the extreme superficiality—the uppermost surface of the surface.
“The Duc had absolutely no qualms in speaking in this way about his wife‘s petty discomforts and his own to a dying man, for, because they were what was uppermost in his mind, they seemed more important to him.”
😢
Every really original invention stirs the interest even of people who can derive no benefit from it.
“In fact, he had the constant habit of comparing what he had heard or read with things that were already familiar to him, and if he could detect no difference between the two, he felt a stir of admiration. This sort of mental response is not to be ignored, for, applied to political conversation, to the reading of newspapers, it shapes public opinion and thus contributes to the greatest events in the world.”
So accurate 😂
“There is nothing like desire for obstructing any resemblance between what one says and what one has on one‘s mind.”
“Only I felt not that it was the sentence that was badly constructed, but that I myself lacked the energy and agility to see it through to the end. I would make a fresh start, working really hard to reach the point where I could see the new connections between things. At each attempt, about halfway through the sentence, I would fall back defeated...”
In which Proust so accurately describes the exact experience of reading his own prose! 😂
“But my aunt had other ideas—though these days she‘s reaching an age when she has scarcely an idea left in her head.”
😂
“Being a great lady means playing the great lady, which in turn means, partly at least, playing at simplicity. It is an extremely costly game, all the more so because simplicity delights people only on condition that they know you are capable of its opposite—namely, that you are very rich.”
🙌
“An artist, however ordinary, is always ready to be set above his rivals, but does try to ensure that they get the appreciation they deserve.”
True.
“It is true that, since we are always concerned to hide our feelings, we never think about the manner in which we express them. Then, suddenly, there is this obscene and unfamiliar animal inside us making itself heard, in a voice that can sometimes even manage to frighten the recipient of the involuntary, elliptical, and almost irresistible disclosure of our defect or vice”
Mood...
We forgive the crimes of individuals, but not their participation in a collective crime.
Reading wrap-up: These are the 2 books I read in August. I must admit I was hoping to read more this month since 2 weeks out of my 3 week vacation was this month. Guess this is what happens when you start binging on The Vampire Diaries from season one in the hope of watching all seven seasons before the last is out on DVD 😀
At least I enjoyed both of these reading experiences 😀
#bestofaugust #anditsaugust #booksacrossoceans #augustlibrary17
pickI enjoyed this book a lot. Could it perhaps mean that I begin to understand and appreciate Proust?! #1001books
Bedtime reading. ❤️📖🐱💤
Proust on a boat or with a goat. Really, anytime.
