"In Search of Lost Time" by Marcel Proust. (1913-27)...

Reading this novel has been delayed since August 2010. As I am currently unemployed and have no reason not to, I will spend the meantime attempting to finish this opus. Unfortunately I have the voice of Cormac McCarthy in my thoughts hissing that Proust isn't even a real writer, and it is one of the toughest books next to the Origin of Species by Charles Darwin. But it can only be worth my time, I suspect. There are things it is teaching me about myself and other people that are only to valuable. Next to Tolstoy's War and Peace, for similar reasons, this piece of literature looks as though it is going to effect a cosmic shift for me.

"When we are in love, our love is too big a thing for us to be able to contain it within ourselves. It radiates towards the loved one, finds there a surface which arrests it, forcing it to return to its starting point, and it is this repercussion of our own feeling which we call the other's feelings and which charms us more then than on its outward journey because we do not recognize it as having originated in ourselves."
- Marcel Proust, "Within a Budding Grove", p253

This quote is particularly evocative of the type of novel In Search of Lost Time is, especially Within a Budding Grove, the second volume of seven. Swann's Way, the introductory volume, is an expression of youth, curiosity and coming to life and self awareness and then Within a Budding Grove introduces layers of emoional detail and experience to the story. The central characters either bloom or wither, but the key focus is movement and life. Expressions like the above which refer to the feeling of love give me simpatico with the author and gives a more tangible expression of the burden that love has if kept to oneself. Love remains the same but it may at times remain hidden like a flower not yet blossomed or a creature yet in chrysalis.

The purpose of this novel, it seems, is to celebrate life and love and the expression thereof. The reading is at time tedious and portraits of characters not always agreeable. But that is the quality of life itself and the painstaking attention Proust draws to seemingly innocuous events is a way of creating a universe that only existed with the authors memories. The gentleness of the narration and the reflective nature of Proust's character in the novel are a reassurance of human gentleness itself and make the reading a pleasure. Even Proust's naivete and his consistent selfishness are endearing qualities that can be related to and understood.

One more wonderful thing to be realised by a close reading of this novel is the way in which the narrative assists the reader in recalling his own memories. Quickly after beginning this novel I began to walk in my mind with Proust by blossoming white hawthorns and recall my own past, the image of nature and the patience of this author useful implements to achieve this purpose. My purpose in reading Proust is partly an intellectual challenge; I have the habit of looking for literature that deeply moves and captivates but also makes the reading and understanding enormously difficult. It's similar to my approach to life; things are only ever worth saying if you spend your time saying them. Time and belaboured attention together serve a moral-building purpose.

I will review this novel once I finish it but I do wonder... when will that be?


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