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#Proust
review
Mattsbookaday
In The Absence Of Men | Philippe BESSON
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Pickpick

In the Absence of Men, by Philippe Besson (2007, transl. 2025)
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Premise: In 1916 Paris, a queer teenager experiences love for the first time in very different relationships with a middle-aged writer and a soldier on leave from the War.

Review: Once again, Philippe Besson has demonstrated his knack for exceptional, short, melancholic, queer fiction. Cont.

Mattsbookaday This excels in evoking both a moment—Paris during WWI—and a time in life—the first experience of real adult relationships. I have to say the ending involves a revelation that felt unearned and silly to me, but overall this was a great success.

Bookish Pair: Besson‘s previous book translated into English was Lie with Me (2017, transl. 2019)
(edited) 2w
6 likes1 stack add1 comment
blurb
Dilara
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Literary memoirs are my favourite: I am halfway through Laure Murat's essay on Proust's In Search of Lost Time, which she realised when she read it aged 20, described her milieu (the French aristocracy), was partly based on members of her family, & is as relevant now as it was then. She walks us through the parallels & is pitiless about their flaws. She was rejected when she came out as lesbian & feels a kinship with Proust, who was gay.
#LGBTQ

21 likes1 stack add
quote
Trashcanman
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Let us be grateful to the people who make us happy; they are the charming gardeners who make our souls blossom.

#findingjoy
#14639769

TheBookHippie I miss California… soaking in your picture!!! 3mo
Trashcanman @TheBookHippie today‘s been a great day. ❤️🤗 3mo
TheBookHippie @Trashcanman I‘m so glad. 3mo
Leftcoastzen 👍👏🏖️ 3mo
Bookwormjillk Love that quote 3mo
50 likes5 comments
blurb
ManyWordsLater
The Past Recaptured | Marcel Proust
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2024 wrap up:
41 books read
24 fiction
17 non-fiction
Favorites: More Work for Mother, Mother Tongue, Poverty by America, The Best of Everything

Ruthiella Nice work! 👏👏👏 6mo
48 likes1 comment
blurb
nanuska_153
In Search of Lost Time | Marcel Proust
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Finally managed to find a pretty enough edition of In Search of Lost Time. Definitely going to be one of my 2025 reading projects 🥰

Ruthiella Good luck! 👍 8mo
BarbaraBB Gorgeous edition! 8mo
nanuska_153 @Ruthiella thanks! I enjoyed so much Swann in love that I'm really looking forward to it 8mo
nanuska_153 @BarbaraBB thanks 😊 8mo
37 likes4 comments
blurb
AllDebooks
Letters of Marcel Proust | Marcel Proust
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#Litsolace #Midsummersolace

What are you grateful for today?

I'm so very grateful for this wonderful Litsy community. It's such a safe, supportive group of people. 💚📚💚

wanderinglynn I‘m grateful for butterflies, moths, bees, bats, & other pollinators that play an important but often overlooked role in ecosystem health. 🌻 13mo
dabbe I'm grateful for yet another day! 💚💙💚 13mo
34 likes2 comments
review
JulietteReadsALot
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Panpan

2/5
First, I think these poems were collected mostly from personal letters Proust sent to friends, so they were not intended for publication.
Because of this, they are not polished, they tend to be simplistic in the rhymes, but also they contain a lot of personal references or references to characters from that period, which can make their context difficult to understand.

21 likes1 comment
review
Taylor
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Pickpick

Phenomenal ending to an unreal work.

Mind-bendy, ultra-reflective and fascinating, feels like something written in the future.... Pretty often I'd say to myself "Yeah this is wild stuff," especially in the second half. Somehow he managed to end this thing without letting me down at all. I love it.

11 likes1 stack add
quote
Taylor

It seems now therefore that there is no humiliation so great that one should not put up with it easily, in the knowledge that after a few years our buried faults will be no more than an invisible dust over which will smile the smiling and blossoming peace of nature.