tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7584591369744663152011-04-21T17:03:07.120-07:00Marionoreply@blogger.comBlogger71100tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-758459136974466315.post-62269768068170725832008-01-27T09:39:00.001-08:002008-04-21T07:49:59.061-07:00

My Proust project has proven to be more time and energy consuming than I had expected. I think I'll just read the books and not try to chronicle my reactions to them here. What I'm trying to say is that Marcel et Moi is over. Sorry if I got your hopes up, only to dash them. If you can't live without some Milosevic prose, you can satisfy your craving on my new blog, aptly named Mario Milosevic.

Marionoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-758459136974466315.post-34710888372007153012007-12-05T07:15:00.000-08:002007-12-05T12:50:36.869-08:00

One of the first things to notice is that Marcel is very comfortable with servants and the whole notion of a servant class to do his work for him. There’s nothing objectively wrong with this but it does indicate a certain level of leisure. He has the time and energy to concoct gargantuan sentences. I noticed this the first time through the first section. Now I’m slowing down on the rereading and

Marionoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-758459136974466315.post-60838852288959294612007-12-03T10:38:00.001-08:002007-12-05T07:42:55.797-08:00

I have a terrible memory for names, whether in “real” life or in books. This often means I don’t know what’s going on in “real” life or in the book I’m reading. What I sometimes do in novels, when I come to a name, is to let my eyes slide over the letters and assign it a random auditory snippet in my mind. It’s kind of like a sound doodle.This is probably not the best way to read and understand a

Marionoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-758459136974466315.post-24381937500216828442007-12-02T10:17:00.000-08:002007-12-05T07:42:36.977-08:00

A madeleine is a small cake in the shape of a sea shell. Marcel eats one of these, dipped in a cup of tea, and the taste of it brings back his life as a child with the memories of cakes when he was much younger triggering further memories and these in turn bringing other memories in a mad tumble. Proust describes the experience in minute detail. It is a stunning passage, justly famous.But there

Marionoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-758459136974466315.post-78614960821134622352007-11-29T07:15:00.000-08:002007-12-05T07:42:20.139-08:00

Yesterday’s New York Times Crossword had the following clue for 46 down: “Subject of the 1999 film ‘Le Temps Retrouvé,’” which is the title of the final volume of A la recherche du temps perdu. So the answer to the clue, of course, is Proust. Seeing that clue in the crossword was like a sign from Will Shortz that my Proust project has been blessed by the stars. Thanks Will.Here’s something I

Marionoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-758459136974466315.post-88261663341768243172007-11-28T08:10:00.000-08:002007-12-05T07:41:52.874-08:00

Most nights I read in bed, usually for an hour or so before going to sleep. Last night I picked up The Way by Swann’s, the first volume in Penguin’s recent edition of In Search of Lost Time. Well, there’s the protagonist of the book (Is it Proust himself or someone else? I don’t know yet.) reading in bed. It was an amusing juxtaposition of art and real life. I immediately warmed to the book and

Marionoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-758459136974466315.post-71002811981578848612007-11-27T00:02:00.000-08:002007-11-29T10:20:02.966-08:00

Every novel is an equal collaboration between the writer and the reader and it is the only place in the world where two strangers can meet on terms of absolute intimacy.–Paul AusterI know little of Marcel Proust’s life, beyond the sketchy details in the Wikipedia entry about him. (On the other hand, he didn’t know anything about me, so that makes us roughly even.)I know little French. I could not

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