EVERYONE Has Read This but Me - The Catch-Up Book Club discussion

Welcome to the buddy read for Marcel Proust's seven volume novel known as In Search of Lost Time / Remembrance of Things Past / À la Recherche du Temps Perdu.

As it is such a grande (french accent please) piece of work, we'll begin with vol 1 Swann's Way at the end of June.

As the nature of the book is more philosophical than plot (and it looks like it's only in three parts, not chapters) I'm not sure how much this will apply but I think it's good practice to write briefly where we have gotten up at the top of our posts so as to let each other know where we're at and hopefully not spoil sections. This might be completely unnecessary, so let's see.

How would you like to go about reading and discussing the novel?

I did a random internet search for a timeline and there are actually a few groups on Goodreads dedicated to Proust in a year. I wouldn’t know how to break up the read, so I thought it might be a good place to start.

Here is a schedule from a group in 2017:

https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...

Wow you lady's do not waste time!
So long as otherts know we are open for more readers.

First thing I like about that schedule is that it gives me a chance to procrastinate until January.
10-15 pages a day dose not seem that hard. I used to be good for a lot more than that. Now the book has to be something i get into, and I do not remember being that engaged back in High School. But making this stretch out longer makes no sense.

Respect to ya'll work and the other guys efforts.
First reading assignment done by June 22 or 29?

Like I said I have a Kindle copy, but I intend to get single volumes hard copy. Any suggestions?
O and one more thing. I like pictures in my Buddy Read. Any one else?

https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Fi...
mage:

Illiers, the country town overlooked by a church steeple where Proust spent time as a child and which he described as "Combray" in the novel. The town adopted the name Illiers-Combray in homage.GNU Free Documentation License
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GNU_Fre...

Which translation will you all be following?

I have the D. J. Enright /Terence Kilmartin’s reworking of C. K. Scott Moncrieff’s translation.
There was a boxed set on Amazon that I purchased previously.
I don’t know that we’d all be reading from the same translation tho.

I can do the 22nd. I’m ready to dive in.

I too have Moncrieff translation. It’s available on Project Gautenberg.

I think my Kindle copy is Moncrieff . I kinda want a different one for the paper copy. Suggestions?

The topic of translations was also discussed in the previous groups, and since I know nothing about Proust more than Madeleines and this is a big read, I keep sourcing it for information...

https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...

So... are we going to read Proust from June 2020 ( what a year...) to June 2021?
I forgot which group but we are Tale of Genji for this whole year 52 chapters in 52 weeks...it’s nice.

Nidhi wrote: "So... are we going to read Proust from June 2020 ( what a year...) to June 2021?
I forgot which group but we are Tale of Genji for this whole year 52 chapters in 52 weeks...it’s nice."

Seriously? Can you send to me the Genji Link?

FWIW I am reading that the updated translation by Lydia Davis is the way to go. As Of now I have the former on Kindle and the other on order. Recommending you look for Swann's Way: In Search of Lost Time, Vol. 1 (Penguin Classics Deluxe Edition) at Thrift Books

I have the Moncrieff translation but since this conversation I have looked up the Lydia Davis translation and can see the benefits. Annoying... I guess it gives me a different angle in the years to come (if I want to read it again).

Phrodrick wrote: "Nidhi wrote: "So... are we going to read Proust from June 2020 ( what a year...) to June 2021?
I forgot which group but we are Tale of Genji for this whole year 52 chapters in 52 weeks...it’s nice..."

https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...

Hi there!

I also have a Proust reading project.

I started by buying all the volumes one by one some four years ago. I wanted a specific publication, but some of the volumes were already out of print. Funny, I just obtained the last one about a month ago. This collection of the seven books is, of course, a translation into Portuguese.

So, this buddy read comes timely. However, I wasn't thinking of reading this now. I might give it a try and see how it goes. No guarantee. :-)

I also obtained a very interesting book, a dictionary of places and names of "À la Recherche...", which seems to be a translation of this one:

Le Bottin Proustien: Qui est qui dans "La Recherche"? by Michel Erman


Another one on my shelves that might be a good read alongside::

How Proust Can Change Your Life by Alain de Botton

I updated the dates from the 2017 readings to the current 2020/2021 read, starting June 22:

ROUGH SCHEDULE:

• Jun 22 – Aug 10: Swann’s Way / The Way By Swann
• Aug 17 – Oct 12: Within a Budding Grove / In the Shadow of Young Girls in Flower.
• Oct 19 – Dec 14: The Guermantes Way / The Guermantes Way
• Dec 21 – Feb 15: Cities of the Plain / Sodom and Gomorrah
• Feb 22 – Mach 29: The Captive / The Prisoner
• April 5 – May 3: The Sweet Cheat Gone / The Fugitive
• May 10 – Jun 14: Time Regained / Finding Time Again

WEEKLY SCHEDULE

JUNE
Week ending 6/22: Swann's Way, to page 64
Week ending 6/29: Swann's Way, to page 139 (page break, next section starts: “While I was reading in the garden...”)

JULY
Week ending 7/6: Swann's Way, to page 224 (to the paragraph beginning: “It is perhaps from another impression which I received at Montjouvain...”)
Week ending 7/13: Swann's Way, to page 299 (to the paragraph beginning: “And so, when the pianist had finished...”)
Week ending 7/20: Swann's Way, to page 379 (end of page to the paragraph beginning “One day, when reflections of this sort had brought him back...”)
Week ending 7/27: Swann's Way, to page 457 (to the paragraph beginning “It was at the Marquise de Saint-Euverte’s...”)

AUGUST
Week ending 8/3: Swann's Way, to page 529 (to the paragraph beginning: “On certain evenings...”)
Week ending 8/10: Swann's Way, finish
Week ending 8/17: Within a Budding Grove, to page 83 (to the paragraph beginning: “I continued to go along the Champs-Elysées on fine days...”)
Week ending 8/24: Within a Budding Grove, to page 167 (to the paragraph beginning: “Meanwhile we had taken our places at table...”)
Week ending 8/31: Within a Budding Grove, to page 248 (to the paragraph beginning: “Granted that the intellectual distinction of a salon and its elegance...”)

SEPTEMBER
Week ending 9/7: Within a Budding Grove, to page 332 (to the paragraph beginning: “There is perhaps nothing that gives us so strong an impression...”)
Week ending 9/14: Within a Budding Grove, to page 417 (to the paragraph beginning: “After dinner, when I had gone upstairs...”)
Week ending 9/21: Within a Budding Grove, to page 502 (page break, next section starts: “That day, as for some days past...”)
Week ending 9/28: Within a Budding Grove, to page 582 (to the paragraph beginning: “I paced up and down the room...”)

OCTOBER
Week ending 10/5: Within a Budding Grove, to page 661 (to the paragraph beginning: “When we had finished eating we would play games...”)
Week ending 10/12: Within a Budding Grove, finish
Week ending 10/19: The Guermantes Way, to page 93 (to the paragraph beginning: “To return to the problem of sound...”)
Week ending 10/26: The Guermantes Way, to page 183 (to the paragraph beginning: “I was wretched at having failed to say good-bye...”)

NOVEMBER
Week ending 11/2: The Guermantes Way, to page 273 (to the paragraph beginning: “Mme de Guermantes had sat down...”)
Week ending 11/9: The Guermantes Way, to page 362 (to the paragraph beginning: “Mme de Villeparisis meanwhile was not too well pleased...”)
Week ending 11/16: The Guermantes Way, to page 450 (end of page, to the paragraph beginning: “Luckily, we were soon rid of Françoise’s daughter...”)
Week ending 11/23: The Guermantes Way, to page 540 (to the paragraph beginning: “It was Robert de Saint-Loup...”)
Week ending 11/30: The Guermantes Way, to page 631 (to the paragraph beginning: “As for the Guermantes of the true flesh and blood...”)

DECEMBER
Week ending 12/7: The Guermantes Way, to page 728 (to the paragraph beginning: “There was at Combray a Rue de Saintrailles...”)
Week ending 12/14: The Guermantes Way, finish
Week ending 12/21: Sodom and Gomorrah, to page 82 (to the paragraph beginning: “In the ordinary course of life...”)
Week ending 12/28: Sodom and Gomorrah, to page 164 (to the paragraph beginning: “We were told that the carriage was at the door...”)

JANUARY
Week ending 1/4: Sodom and Gomorrah, to page 245 (to the end of Part Two: Chapter One)
Week ending 1/11: Sodom and Gomorrah, to page 326 (to the paragraph beginning: “”About this time there occurred at the Grand Hotel a scandal...”)
Week ending 1/18: Sodom and Gomorrah, to page 407 (to the paragraph beginning: “The faithful entered the drawing room...”)
Week ending 1/25: Sodom and Gomorrah, to page 489 (to the paragraph beginning: “By this time, Mme Cottard was fast asleep...”)

FEBRUARY
Week ending 2/1: Sodom and Gomorrah, to page 568 (to the paragraph beginning: “After dinner the car would bring Albertine back...”)
Week ending 2/8: Sodom and Gomorrah, to page 641 (to the paragraph beginning: “Cottard arrived at length...”)
Week ending 2/15: Sodom and Gomorrah, finish
Week ending 2/22: The Captive, to page 93 (to the paragraph beginning: “On other evenings, I undressed...”)

MARCH
Week ending 3/1: The Captive, to page 187 (to the paragraph beginning: “Already, in the case of quite a number of woman at any rate...”)
Week ending 3/8: The Captive, to page 277 (to the paragraph beginning: “I guessed at once that M. de Charlus...”)
Week ending 3/15: The Captive, to page 368 (to the paragraph beginning: “Since M. de Charlus also enjoyed repeating what one person had said...”)
Week ending 3/22: The Captive, to page 462 (to the paragraph beginning: “Already for some little time I had felt...”)
Week ending 3/29: The Captive, finish

APRIL
Week ending 4/5: The Fugitive, to page 637 (to the paragraph beginning: “Set free once more, released from the cage...”)
Week ending 4/12: The Fugitive, to page 708 (page break, to the section beginning: “I had suffered indeed at Balbec...”)
Week ending 4/19: The Fugitive, to page 783 (to the paragraph beginning: “A month later, the Swann girl...”)
Week ending 4/26: The Fugitive, to page 860 (to the paragraph beginning: “Meanwhile, Mme de Villeparisis...”)

MAY
Week ending 5/3: The Fugitive, finish
Week ending 5/10: Time Regained, to page 88 (to the paragraph beginning: “I had, in any case, not remained long...”)
Week ending 5/17: Time Regained, to page 176 (to the paragraph beginning: “These men, as they chatted quietly together...”)

Week ending 5/24: Time Regained, to page 265 (to the paragraph beginning: “But this species of optical illusion...”)
Week ending 5/31: Time Regained, to page 354 (to the paragraph beginning: “And now I have begun to understand...”)

JUNE
Week ending 6/7: Time Regained, to page 445 (to the paragraph beginning: “I told Mme de Guermates...”)
Week ending 6/14: Time Regained, finish

There are also schedules for a new translation and kindle editions if this doesn't fit your edition, let me know.

Brenda wrote: "I updated the dates from the 2017 readings to the current 2020/2021 read, starting June 22:

ROUGH SCHEDULE:

• Jun 22 – Aug 10: Swann’s Way / The Way By Swann
• Aug 17 – Oct 12: Within a Budding G..."

So much work
Thank You

Marcos wrote: "Hi there!

I also have a Proust reading project.

I started by buying all the volumes one by one some four years ago. I wanted a specific publication, but some of the volumes were already out of pr..."

Portuguese, Impressive.
Please follow us and pitch in when and as you care .

Thank you, but really I owe the debt to those in the previous groups.

Thanks for organizing this buddy read. I read the first book many years ago, but didn't continue. No real reason, but I lost momentum. I think doing it this way will give me the impetus I need to get this done! I would also like to tead the de Botton book.

Very excited about this. Planned on reading Swann's Way this year for the first time, and hoped to read them all at some point. This will make it much more enjoyable.

Welcome also to Stacey and Ryan!

I’m glad to see the group growing. It will be a long read so the more supporters to keep us all motivated will certainly be advantageous and also add more contributions to the commentary.

Thank you Brenda.... for the schedule. 😀

Welcome! It's great too see some new faces :) my copy arrived today, can't wait to get started with you all.
And thanks Brenda, great work. Very helpful for the future.

Just wondering if it would not be a good idea to have a Telegram group of a temporary nature just for this buddy read for the discussion of little things (as opposed to those topics of a more permanent nature) pertaning to this book?

Sorry Li He can you explain what you mean?

Sorry, I mean Telegram App (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Telegra...)
or WhatsApp or Messenger or something similar. But I have never used these for book discussions so I'm not if it's going to be a good idea or not.

I've had some experience like this. I think it creates a kind of competition. If you say something via one media, those not using it lose that information - and vice-versa.

Also, some use WhatsApp, others Telegram, etc. If we choose one app, to keep up to date, those not using it would have to create an account there. More apps, passwords etc.

I think it is better to keep only one communication channel, and that is the original purpose of the group here at Goodreads, after all.

Anyway, just a point of view, nothing against it, actually . :-)

I also think that GR is enough to record our discussion for future. I surf through it for some difficult books like Ulysses.
That way members can always join us in reading.

If those apps work for some, go for it. I will not be be in that number.
Nor do I care for the notion that I/we can stop those who use it/them whatever.

Thanks for explaining. I'll also just be using this Goodreads format as I find it easiest.

I have a very few pages of the Overture read.
It seems to me that the technique is to dive in and go for distance, doing so with fin de siècle elegance or to sip slightly s one might an esp delicate aperitif.
Mean time I will be passing one and just took possession of
I have/had 3 of these titles in what ever order and however I come across them.
If I can find some of the pictures on line I intend to share some.
The artwork matches the novelist wonderfully
image:

And une petite jest
image:

My parents are here visiting so I’m baking because I have an excuse, so I made Madeleines yesterday!

Hi everyone ! Just a reminder.... We'll start our discussion on June 22 of the first 64 pages.

Has is the read going for you? Without revealing any spoilers until we start the actual discussion...does anyone have any thoughts so far in general?

Another group member mentioned they listened to a podcast...which was a great idea and wished I would have thought of it.

I found this one which I thought was very entertaining if anyone is interested. It does talk about the book as a whole so would be considered as containing spoilers if you're looking to avoid that.
https://www.backlisted.fm/episodes/10...

Thanks for the reminder Brenda. I can say that I'm really enjoying the writing style, the way he is kind of saying nothing and everything. It's extremely nostalgic and melancholic and I can also see how that may not be to everyone's taste.

I agree Betsy, I like the writing so far. I didn’t know what to expect - I read a few pages years ago, but had no concept of it as a whole.

I’ve not read much, but I enjoy his descriptive style of writing. I think I had so many misconceptions previously; a lot based on the meager three pages I read and also, it being a LONG book, it was very daunting and probably played with my psyche.

Thank you Phrodrick for suggesting the read! And also for the pictures, they do add to the whole and am glad that you share them.

I am excited for the discussions starting on Monday!

I agree with what you said about having misconceptions on the type of book this is. After reading these first 60 or so pages, I can definitely say it's a new experience of reading for me. It's very hard to stop (not because it's a page-turner or compulsive) but because it blends and blurs that I find it hard to find a place to stop and restart easily. His sentences can go on for over a page (!) and it's heavy with description, sometimes hard to fully understand.

I already want to discuss what's going on, super excited for Monday too!

"It's very hard to stop (not because it's a page-turner or compulsive) but because it blends and blurs that I find it hard to find a place to stop and restart easily. His sentences can go on for over a page (!) and it's heavy with description, sometimes hard to fully understand."

That goes for me too. Exactly as written.

Tomorrow I am going to say some things about where I place this book in a broader tradition and try to give it a type. If only a type that means something to me.

I too wish to thank the rest of the readers. Odds are that I would already feel overwhelmed and tempted to quit.

Lost Time is a lot, and I do mean a lot of great writing. Reading this together will mean more than 1 POV and the benefit of your (collective) insights.

As there have been some general observations, none speaking to specifics in the book. This is where I am in trying to understand what Proust is doing.

While I know enough to know thatt here will be events at various points in the next many pages, mostly the book is not about what happened. In general there is a time line, although there may be some shifting about as memories need not always be in sequence plus concurrent story lines mean there has to be some back and forth in time.

What I was going to say is that this is a book where nothing happens. Not technically correct, but I am not sure that specific events are as important as the descriptions of people, place and emotions. There is action, but maybe action is subordinate to the general flow of thought.

If or to the degree this is true, we may be reading something that will come to be called stream of consciousness (AHA!, Wiki thinks I a m right! ).
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stream_...

Both Wiki and I point to Laurence Sterne's psychological novel Tristram Shandy (1757) The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentlemanas one of the earliest of this type book. I highly recommend it as a relatively silly and delightful read. Also a relatively fun movie.

An old favorite of mine, that many of us read in high school "An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge" (1890), by another American author, Ambrose Bierce An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge is pointed out by Wiki and had not before occurred to me. Bierce is a famous teller of ghost stories and his Devil’s Dictionary a humor classic.

Much more recent is The Mezzanine by Nicholson Baker The Mezzanine. He may be more known for his highly literate smut. But this is very much in the tradition of Tristram Shandy. Light ramblings. And incidentally not smutty. One reviewer, more clever than me called it: In Search of Lost Marbles.

So full circle.

This may help me and I hope sheds some light for you folks.

Thanks Phrodrick, I’ve heard of Tristram Shandy but not read any of the books you mentioned so I will add those to my list.

Your insights were helpful and Betsy I agree as well, I was at a point where I had time for one more paragraph, then realized it was two pages long. Sometimes I do have to read a line or paragraph a few times to understand it as well.

While I always wish I could read a book in its native language, so far I find this reads wonderfully for being a translation. There is still so much depth and the meaning and emotion still comes through.

Today starts our discussion of Swann's Way through page 64, which is through part I of Combray.

(please keep spoilers to this section of the book only.) Thanks!

Phrodrick, what you say here is what I've been thinking:
"What I was going to say is that this is a book where nothing happens. Not technically correct, but I am not sure that specific events are as important as the descriptions of people, place and emotions. There is action, but maybe action is subordinate to the general flow of thought."

This stream of consciousness style (so far) has been really great. It's new for me (I've never read Joyce or other authors that write in this way).

I have many questions though that may be answered by continuing reading, but hey, we can still ask right?
How old is our narrator when he remembers his childhood/youth in Combray (when Swann was 'younger')?
I found the scenes with his mother and the way he wanted to keep a hold of her for himself actually quite relatable. There is something a bit disturbing about it, the way he needs her around almost romantically, but the way it was described emotionally was completely understandable, especially if you look at it with the way you feel when you want someone special around.

Thanks fr for the thoughts. Before I leave this topic, I had meant to add Mrs. Dalloway by Virginia Woolf.

IMHO a lot more readable and arguably more interesting than Ulysses. Woolf was known for using Stream of C but I have not read enough her to be certain. What lifts this above some of the other better knowns is that we see into the minds of several people. and stay with the Joyce convention of this being a single day.

This is my first time reading of In Search of Lost Time, and while I had some context prior to starting it from a podcast episode, some articles, and comments made by my English professors, I was not prepared for this amazing first section!

After reading a bit of it, I thought it would be the conventional older narrator looking back on his childhood, commenting on what happened and why with the knowledge and wisdom acquired in the succeeding years. The first 50 or so pages seem like that. But then, Proust (or rather the narrator Marcel) shows us in the last 10 pages that he has a much more ambitious goal: not merely to remember, but to create. "I put down the cup and examine my own mind. It alone can discover the truth... Seek? More than that: create. It is face to face with something which does not yet exist, which it alone can make actual, which it alone can bring into the light of day" (Page 61 in the Moncrieff/Kilmartin/Enright translation).

I was floored by these last pages, and I'm infinitely more excited for the rest of this volume and the other five volumes. I'm grateful to have this group to discuss it to learn from everyone else to try to grasp this great work of literature.

As with the rest of the group, I think was more than pleasantly surprised after reading the first section.

More than anything I really like Proust's style. Granted it can be long winded, but it still flows, and its poetic and its really saying something. He clearly paints a picture for the reader.

Just the first instance of the trip, the strange surrounding, the excitement, but happy to be home again. I felt in many instances that I could relate to what Proust was narrating, or saying or thinking, or remembering, but he can get all the nuances of thought and expression on paper. Where my thought would have been like a 5 year old in comparison.

I don't know that it was meant to be humorous, it was more the time period, but when he was talking about his father dabbling in meteorology and his mother didn't want to disturb him..."not wishing to penetrate the mysteries of his superior mind." I did burst out laughing.

I find his great-aunt quite curious. She is opinionated and has a great regard for her own opinion, but also seems to feel inferior as well. I wonder if she will play more in his life to come as he seems to give a bit more weight to her personality traits, but then again she has a lot of personality.

Another section that I found amusing was when Swann brought the Asti and the aunts went through this roundabout thank you, How Swann and the grandfather were confused and yet the ladies thought it all quite clear.

I really felt for Proust trying to conjure the thought from the petits Madeleine. I've had that fleeting something before, trying to get a hold of it, but his description of the entirety really brought it to life. I was actually cheering him at the end when he found the source. And I loved how he likened the memory flooding back like the opening of the Japanese paper in water.

I am really enjoying the book. In many instances I could put myself in his thoughts or conjuring, but he can bring it to life. AT this point for me, beside the length of the book, I find it very readable and engrossing. I appreciate how he can take even the mundane and rip it open and expose all the nuances of it and give it weight and meaning and complexity.

I'm really looking forward to the whole of it and am also glad this read happened. I do appreciate everyone's views on the read!

I am not sure he wants us to think of these memories as entirely fictional. That is his fictional narrator may be inventing memories which , if true mean that we have a fictional character mixing fictional and actual memories. Is this what they call an unreliable narrator?
I just think that is an unnecessary complication. Can't prove it a "wrong" conclusion, I just think it is one wrinkle too many.

On the other hand I had not expected so much sly humor. The Aunt who is a fake invalid , the several Maid co-conspirators and the entire biz about a man being in the neighborhood who is not known to her window on the world Auntie. She is just as exercised by the thought of an unknown dog in her line of sight....

Much of the class consciousness and high middle class morality is a cross between social criticism and social satire. And to me unexpected.

A fun if challenging, short book of Proust as a satirist: The Lemoine Affair

Phrodrick wrote: "I am not sure he wants us to think of these memories as entirely fictional. That is his fictional narrator may be inventing memories which , if true mean that we have a fictional character mixing f..."

I agree that the narrator doesn't want us to think of them as fictional. What I meant by "create" was to make meaning out of his past. Of course, I'm not sure exactly what the narrator means by that statement, but it seems he was setting it out as a goal, and distinguishing between merely remembering and creating. I'm very interested in time as a theme. It's one of my favorite aspects of reading Faulkner. So I'm looking forward to more of the narrator's musings about the past, memory, and time.

I agree about the unexpected humor. Loved the aunts, especially the great-aunt. I found Swann's nonchalance in the face of these ridiculous figures (the aunts) to be maybe the funniest part.

Ryan wrote: "Phrodrick wrote: "I am not sure he wants us to think of these memories as entirely fictional. That is his fictional narrator may be inventing memories which , if true mean that we have a fictional ..."

In choosing to continue this discussion, I want to be clear that it is not my intention to disagree or challenge . Your clarification stands and needs no further defense.

That said the question of what Proust was attempting is interesting.
I tend to be among other things a research kinda guy and I came across two posts, both filled with spoilers. In fact this one
https://www.readingproust.com/swann.htm
pretty much exists to tell the story of this book.

Skipping to the end the author gets into a lot of detail about why one translation over another. To be quick he is not a fan of Captain Scott Moncrieff, MC, survivor with injuries of WW I and eary (Firest?) translator of the books. Keeping in mind Proust had nto finished much more than book 1 and 2, if that many and therefor the Capt (ex) could not know all about what Proust had in mind.
Proust was angry at the name: Swan's Way as the title for book I and was furious that Moncrieff woosied out in his title for book two:

Within a Budding Grove.. should be, well here is that paragraph:
"Not at all chastened by Proust’s rather mild rebuke, Scott Moncrieff would continue to bowdlerize his titles: À l'ombre de jeunes filles en fleurs became Within a Budding Grove, and Sodome et Gomorrhe became The Cities of the Plain. Proust, who died in November 1922, did not live to see these later travesties. "

Back to Proust's possible intentions:
"This limitation was obvious in the translated book. Scott Moncrieff chose to call it Swann’s Way, which irritated Proust when he learned it in September 1922. Not only did it refer (as he had intended) to the path leading past Swann’s home near Combray, but it also suggested that the novel might be about Swann’s way of life, or his personal manner. (As it happens, I like that ambiguity, and so do many students of the book.) A happier idea, Proust thought, would have been to call the book “The Way to Swann’s.” But that disappointment was a minor one, compared to his upset at the overall title. His novel had become the Shakespearian Remembrance of Things Past, from Sonnet 30. “Cela détruit le titre!” Proust supposedly cried. (“That destroys the title!”) His story was not about remembering the past, but about returning to it — recapturing it — finding it again. Indeed, that was the whole point of writing it! "

Because of the interesting things about the various translations, for each book and because I am not sure what a spoiler is in these books I am recommending what this person has to say

Post to follow: