The Year of Reading Proust discussion

This thread is for the discussion that will take place through Sunday, 21 Apr. of Within a Budding Grove, to page 661 (to the paragraph beginning: “When we had finished eating we would play games...”)

Yet another of those surprises in the plot.

If anybody thought that with all those musings and all those descriptions there was no suspense to this book, was mistaken or "désappointé".

And it just gets better and better, doesn't it? All those wonderful descriptions and musings! And that wonderful wonderful speech from Elstir about the stupidities of our past and the growth of wisdom. I have a birthday this coming Friday and I am going to read this passage out loud FOR SURE on that day!

Cassian wrote: "And it just gets better and better, doesn't it? All those wonderful descriptions and musings! And that wonderful wonderful speech from Elstir about the stupidities of our past and the growth of wis..."

So many birthdays.. Cassian, you should visit the Lounge to announce that birthday (is it yours?) and may be receive your cake...

I agree, the whold Elstir passage is like visiting a whole museum...

Kalliope wrote: "Yet another of those surprises in the plot.

If anybody thought that with all those musings and all those descriptions there was no suspense to this book, was mistaken or "désappointé"."

Yes, I'm about 20 pages or so into this week's readings, when he asks Elstir those questions... Proust plants these little seeds and it is fun to see how they develop. Now I have to go back through the earlier parts and refresh myself on the scenes (view spoiler)[with the Verdurins (hide spoiler)]that are referenced

I was impressed by Elstir's explanation on the value of non-repudiation of the past, that he was M. Biche at the Verdurins. I was disappointed that the Narrator didn't expound on Elstir's "instructive" and calm confession; that when he left Elstir his thoughts (and our reading) turned to the band of girls once again, not so much to them themselves but to how he might appear to them.

To give Proust and the Narrator credit, perhaps this is part of the Narrator's past life that should not be "expunged" according to Elstir.

Anyway...

On entering any social gathering, when one is young, one loses consciousness of one's old self, one becomes a different man, every drawing-room being a fresh universe in which, coming under the sway of a new moral perspective, we fasten our attention, as if they were to matter to us for all time, on people, dances, card-tables, ail of which we shall have forgotten by the morning. ML p. 615

Here is Edmund White quoting Colette on meeting Proust for the first time, in the New York Times:

…at a literary salon, "I was pursued, politely, all evening by a young and pretty boy of letters." Because of her cropped hair, unusual for the period, he kept comparing her to the young god Hermes or to a cupid drawn by Prud'hon. "My little flatterer, excited by his own evocations, wouldn't leave me alone for a second.... He gazed at me with caressing, long-lashed eyes…

She didn't forget.

Eugene wrote: I was impressed by Elstir's explanation on the value of non-repudiation of the past, that he was M. Biche at the Verdurins

I also thought that this was Proust talking to us readers about the Narrator. Proust isn't at all shy about showing us the Narrator at his worst. But the Narrator is young, and like the young Elstir, this is his path to a better self and a better understanding.

Eugene wrote: "Here is Edmund White quoting Colette on meeting Proust for the first time, in the New York Times:
…at a literary salon, "I was pursued, politely, all evening by a young and pretty boy of letters." Because of her cropped hair, unusual for the period, he kept comparing her to the young god Hermes or to a cupid drawn by Prud'hon. "My little flatterer, excited by his own evocations, wouldn't leave me alone for a second.... He gazed at me with caressing, long-lashed eyes..."

Colette captured Proust exactly as I imagine the narrator. I can see him insisting that she keep the rose from his 'bouttonnière".
That he first has to finish eating a banal chocolate eclair before going with Elstir to be introduced to Albertine is rather ironic given how he has ached and longed for this introduction. However, I'm particularly enjoying the way he analyses his ability to separate the 'present moment' from his intense feelings about it which he will only fully enjoy later; 'emotion recollected in tranquility'.

Fionnuala wrote: "Eugene wrote: "Here is Edmund White quoting Colette on meeting Proust for the first time, in the New York Times:
…at a literary salon, "I was pursued, politely, all evening by a young and pretty bo..."

Éclair au café
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Fil...

Marcelita wrote: Éclair au café
Toutes mes excuses, Marcelita, there's nothing banal about an éclair au café from Fauchon.

And, having read on a few pages, I've realised that there was nothing banal about the écair the narrator took the time to finish before his introduction to Albertine either. It was being noted for future delectation...

Fionnuala wrote: "Marcelita wrote: Éclair au café
Toutes mes excuses, Marcelita, there's nothing banal about an éclair au café from Fauchon.

And, having read on a few pages, I've realised that there was nothing ban..."

The éclairs were originally called "petites duchesses" or "pain à la duchesse".

They are very common in Spain as well, although they are of French origin.

Kalliope wrote: "The éclairs were originally called "petites duchesses" ...."
Oh no, Kal, is that a spoiler? Is Albertine going to become an éclair at some future date?
Je plaisante of course but you never know with Proust - what I took for a simple éclair may turn out to be fourré full of an infinity of possibilities...

Fionnuala wrote: "Kalliope wrote: "The éclairs were originally called "petites Je plaisante of course but y..."

I would not know...!!!.. but you are right in that anything can happen with Proust. He is like a magician pulling a rabbit - or a duchesse - out of a hat...!!!

Eugene: that he was M. Biche at the Verdurins. Somewhere--and I cannot remember where--I've read that "M. Biche" is sort of an equivalent of "Mr. Sweetie." All you French speakers: help me on this one; is this true? How would you translate it? (Also he is called "M. Tiche" sometimes)

Elizabeth wrote: "...I.'ve read that "M. Biche" is sort of an equivalent of "Mr. Sweetie." All you French speakers: help me on t..."

I'm a bit confused about what Proust intended here. 'Ma biche' (doe) is a term of endearment but used for a woman usually.

Proust speaks again in this section of the unique power which the stranger, that unknown person, une passante, seen in the street and about whom we know nothing, can have to haunt our lives. I'm reminded again of the Baudelaire poem, À Une Passante, which Kalliope quoted in an earlier discussion.

I'm also curious about the narrator casually mentioning the phrase from the Vinteuil Sonata which had so preoccupied Swann, as if we are to understand that his and Swann's memories and experiences are somehow intermingled.

Saint-Loup tells the narrator that in the train he has read an interesting book which he bought at the station, written by Arvède Barine, whom he thinks is Russian but who writes very well considering he is a foreigner.

Arvède Barine was the pseudonym of the French historian and biographer, Mme Charles Ernest Vincens, née Louise-Cécile Bouffé (1840-1908).

So far, it appears that the Narrator loves beauty more than he loves Albertine.

He says of Elstir, the artist he is to meet:

...had such a profound influence on my way of seeing things... ML p. 315

On seeing things:

Since I had seen such things depicted in watercolors by Elstir, I sought to find again in reality, I cherished as though for their poetic beauty, the broken gestures of the knives still lying across one another...I tried to find beauty there where I had never imagined before that it could exist, in the most ordinary things... ML p. 613

New York "foodies":

...the white cloth spread on the table as on an altar at which were celebrated the rites of the palate... ML p. 613

Fionnuala wrote: "Kalliope wrote: "The éclairs were originally called "petites duchesses" ...."
Oh no, Kal, is that a spoiler? Is Albertine going to become an éclair at some future date?
Je plaisante of course but y..."

Maybe Albertine will become more like a mille-feuille.
I did not know that an éclair was called "petite duchesse". How interesting.

I love that éclairs are "lightning".

Jocelyne wrote: "Maybe Albertine will become more like a mille-feuille.

Or a trios milles feuilles...

Fionnuala wrote: "Elizabeth wrote: "...I.'ve read that "M. Biche" is sort of an equivalent of "Mr. Sweetie." All you French speakers: help me on t..."

I'm a bit confused about what Proust intended here. 'Ma biche..."

Thank you for reminding us of Baudelaire's poem. I had missed it before.

Jocelyne wrote: "Fionnuala wrote: "Kalliope wrote: "The éclairs were originally called "petites duchesses" ...."

Je plaisan..."

I like the idea of Albertine as a mille feuille.

After listening to Elstir about the beauty of fashion at race courses and particularly in regattas (beginning on ML p. 657) that the young Narrator had found uninteresting until then; after seeing Elstir's paintings of the sea, one that had a woman in white linen on board a yacht flying an American flag, the young Narrator begins to see the sea's contemporary context and consequently see the sea in a profound way.

Elstir teaches the young Narrator to see his text, the sea and it's beauty in a context, as furnished by Elstir's painting, of Summer women aboard yachts flying flags--to see text with context.

Kalliope wrote: "Jocelyne wrote:

I like the idea of Albertine as a mille feuille."

Here is the mille-feuille Albertine:

"... et dans la série indéfinie d'Albertines imaginées qui se succédaient en moi heure par heure. l'Albertine réelle, aperçue sur la plage, ne figurait qu'en tête, comme la créatrice d'un rôle, l'étoile, ne paraît, dans une longue série de représentations, que dans les toutes premières. Cette Albertine là n'était guère qu'une silhouette, tout ce qui s'était superposé était de mon cru.." (Gallimard folio 519)

This week's reading is one of the best in the book.

We see that the portrait of Odette by Elstir as Miss Sacripant, with the “chapeau de paille” et “les cheveux bouffants” (p 507) is later (p. 522) made to correspond to the photograph that Swann had of her, in his desk, as originally mentioned in Un amour de Swann, and now repeated in these two instances above in Noms de pays: Le pays. The same "chapeau de paille" and the "cheveux bouffants".

In both she is a young Odette, looking different from the one in which she later fashioned herself, and both times described as not beautiful ("pas jolie" in the paiting and "assez laide" in the photo).

I will have to go back to that section in the first volume.

Kalliope wrote: "This week's reading is one of the best in the book.

I agree - I've been using my pencil nonstop to underline and make notes.

In this section there are several echoes from the Un amour de Swann episode, but if some of these elements were then presented as observations or experiences belonging to Swann, albeit narrated by the Narrator, they are now presented as if the Narrator himself had experienced them.

One of them is the overall role or presence of Elstir/Biche at the Verdurins. This is presented in more vague terms, and also somewhat at odds with the fact that the Narrator first heard the name of Elstir in Swann’s mouth...

Another is “la petite phrase”..... comme une phrase de Vinteuil qui m’avait enchanté dans la Sonate et que ma mémoire faisait errer de l’andante au finale.... So, it fascinated the Narrator and not Swann, and which now turns out to belong, once the Narrator has had the chance to explore the actual score, to the Scherzo (possibly a third or final movement), instead of the Andante (presumably middle movement).

It seems today is the Day of the Bicycle.

In honor to the "jeunes filles en bicyclette", I am posting some images from a newspaper from 1896, from the Biblioteca Nacional of Spain.

Kalliope wrote: "In this section there are several echoes from the Un amour de Swann episode, but if some of these elements were then presented as observations or experiences belonging to Swann, albeit narrated by the Narrator, they are now presented as if the Narrator himself had experienced them. ..."

These correspondences between the narrator's and Swann's experiences also gave me pause for thought - see comment #15 above.
Sometimes I feel like I will never be able to access the more complex levels of Proust's thinking, at other times I half wonder if he isn't perhaps mixed up and has forgotten that the narrator wasn't yet born when Swann heard la petite phrase or met Elstir! But I know that Swann is supposed to have recounted all that part of his life to the narrator, but still...
I like those instructions for how to ride a bicycle!

Fionnuala wrote: "Kalliope wrote: "In this section there are several echoes from the Un amour de Swann episode, but if some of these elements were then presented as observations or experiences belonging to Swann, al..."

Yes, thank you for pointing at the last paragraph of #15 above. I had overlooked it, partly because I still needed to read this section carefully.

I also found another sample of this mixing Swann's experiences with his own. When a bit later on he talks about Octave he says he is relieved because je pensai avoir découvert un lien entre nous, car j'appris dans la conversation qu'il était un peu parent, et de plus assez aimé, des Verdurin

And now an excerpt from the sentimental "Cavalleria Rusticana" (the most famous of the Verismo operas and premiered in 1890) that Albertine likes so much.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7OvsVS...

Le goût de la peinture avait presque rattrapé celui de la toilette et de toutes les formes de l'élégance, mais n'avait pas été suivi par le goût de la musique qui restait fort en arrière".(Gallimard Folio p.551).

Which is a bit what happened to Marcel Proust himself.

Kalliope wrote: "And now an excerpt from the sentimental "Cavalleria Rusticana" (the most famous of the Verismo operas and premiered in 1890) that Albertine likes so much.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7OvsVS......"

Thanks for posting that - the conductor looked like he was about to burst into tears of joy at the beauty of it all!

Eugene wrote: "After listening to Elstir about the beauty of fashion at race courses and particularly in regattas (beginning on ML p. 657) that the young Narrator had found uninteresting until then; after seeing ..."

Yes, the horse races for me, inevitably, conjure up Dégas's paintings. A couple of them:

In an earlier thread there was a discussion on the relative importance of sight over the other senses. In this section, the Narrator, makes a defense.

...nous ne prenons conscience d'eux que par la perception visuelle réduite à elle-même; mais c'est comme déléguée des autres sens qu'elle se dirige vers les jeunes filles; ils vont chercher l'une derrière l'autre les diverses qualités odorantes, tactiles, savoureuses, qu'ils goûtent ainsi même sans le secours des mains et des lèvres...

The rest of the section above is also very interesting but of itself it is quite powerful... eyes can perform the roles of hands and of lips..

A couple of paintings of "falaises", with architectural echoes.


And of course the very many Etretat paintings. Here is one:



And of course, one of the paintings of the Rouen cathedral:

Interesting that you've juxtaposed the painting of the Creuniers-like cathedral in the sea with the Rouen façade.

These paintings with their marked shadows also have a link with the description of the 'ombres' in Elstir's painting which the narrator anthropomorphs into young girls - or that's how I read it - who 's'étaient réfugiées au pied des rochers, à l'abri du soleil; d'autres nageant lentement sur les eaux comme des dauphins.....

Wow! I've just reached the end of this week's section and discovered all the echoes of the past which can hide within a slice of apricot tart! And not only echoes from the narator's past but echoes too for the reader, of the most beautiful passages of Combray.

Kalliope wrote: "Kalliope wrote: "Jocelyne wrote:

I like the idea of Albertine as a mille feuille."

Here is the mille-feuille Albertine:

"... et dans la série indéfinie d'Albertines imaginées qui se succédaient..."

He does indeed describes her as multi-layered.

Fionnuala wrote: "Interesting that you've juxtaposed the painting of the Creuniers-like cathedral in the sea with the Rouen façade.

These paintings with their marked shadows also have a link with the description of..."

This is a fascinating passage on the "ombres" hidden in the rocks.. will be picked up next week.

Kalliope wrote: "It seems today is the Day of the Bicycle.

In honor to the "jeunes filles en bicyclette", I am posting some images from a newspaper from 1896, from the Biblioteca Nacional of Spain.

"

What fun!

Kalliope wrote: "In an earlier thread there was a discussion on the relative importance of sight over the other senses. In this section, the Narrator, makes a defense.

...nous ne prenons conscience d'eux que par ..."

THanks for pointing this out!

Fionnuala wrote: "Wow! I've just reached the end of this week's section and discovered all the echoes of the past which can hide within a slice of apricot tart! And not only echoes from the narator's past but echoes..."

Echoes for the reader too! And I love your comparing the apricot pie to a flower.

@Fionnuala, messages 15 & 29
@Kalliope, messages 27 & 30

As you know, there are a minimum of 3 narrators in ISOLT: the 1st person younger Narrator, the 1st person older Narrator, the 3rd person omniscient narrator or possibly Marcel Proust as the author; all of them are "unreliable".

1st person narrators are, by definition, not to be depended upon and Marcel Proust might also be, from time to time, unreliable by admission in a letter written by him or by a close reading, as some of us do here, tallying the facts and their contradictions to measure truth by the rules of a genre of fiction that they have accepted ISOLT to fall within.

Genres of fiction have unspoken rules that readers ascribe to and expect writers to follow, but in ISOLT we have multiple speakers in the narration to complicate the classification of genre; what we expect from the 'realist' ISOLT is not always what we get.

Marcel Proust rides roughshod over these 'genre rules'; he says what he wants to, when he wants, when he's not saying what the reader expects which is most of the time: he contradicts himself, he poses impossibilities as actual fact that go against the genre we thought we were reading and so on. The reasons for this are many...

And Marcel Proust is human, consequently fallible and, from time to time, he errs.

Eugene wrote: "...he errs."

???

If you look at Proust's notebooks at the Morgan: all the crossings out, the handwritten additions, the changes of changes, etc. and if you were like Antoine Campagnon in his Proust dans 1913 lectures at the College de France, you might call the text "unstable" as Swann's Way was continually revised to the time of publication.

Maybe Proust didn't err, but found a way to 'better say it'.

Eugene wrote: "Eugene wrote: "...he errs."
???
Maybe Proust didn't err, but found a way to 'better say it'. ."

Thanks, Eugene for these reminders. I do understand the enormous conception behind these 'trois milles feuilles' of scrawled handwriting. I do understand that even with the rewrites and stroking outs, Proust always knows what he is doing and where he is leading us. I have faith.

Eugene wrote: "@Fionnuala, messages 15 & 29
@Kalliope, messages 27 & 30

As you know, there are a minimum of 3 narrators in ISOLT: the 1st person younger Narrator, the 1st person older Narrator, the 3rd person om..."

Eugene,

I am aware that Proust is experimenting with the shifts in viewpoints and with the notion of memory and time and consciousness. But in a similar way to a Cubist painting, it is worthwhile to identify the different planes and sections and fragments and to try and understand how the artist has thereby represented a different reality. His reality, since he is the creator.

Beyond POV, there are also different "personas": the poet, the art critic, the social critic, the satirist, etc.

Another reference to the word literary.What do you think it means in this context?



"Bloch said of her:"She is outstretched on her couch, but in her ubiquity has not ceased to frequent simultaneously vague golf-courses and dubious tennis courts."

He was simply being "literary," of course, but in view of the difficulties which Albertine felt that it might create for him with friends whose invitations she had declined on the plea that she was unable to move, it was quite enough to make her take a profound dislike to the face and the sound of the voice of the young man who said these things."(MKE 629)

This week's section makes for fabulous reading!

The fashion pages tucked in this weeks's reading:

"But I hear that a Venetian artist, called Fortuny, has rediscovered the secret of the craft, and that in a few year's time women will be able to parade around, and better still to sit at home, in brocades as sumptuous as those that Venice adorned for her patrician daughters with patterns brought from the Orient." Elstir (page 653-4)

In "The Life and Work of Mariano Fortuny," Guillermo De Osma's writes that Fortuny applied for the Delphos dress patient from the Office of National de la Propriete Industrielle in Paris on November 4, 1909.
"This invention is related to a type of garment derived from the Classical robe, but its design is so shaped and arranged that it can be worn and adjusted with ease and comfort." (page 216)

No pictures! We will need to wait...until The Captive...to see if what Elstir 'heard' was true.

Kalliope wrote: ".But in a similar way to a Cubist painting, it is worthwhile to identify the different planes and sections and fragments and to try and understand how the artist has thereby represented a different reality. His reality, since he is the creator."

Such an apt way to describe the need we feel for a close reading of Proust and the benefits to be gained from it. Not 'blind faith' but complete as possible understanding.