Proust's Overcoat

I have been at a writing conference in San Francisco and was able to pay a visit to the City Lights Bookstore, a place I have craved to see since I was a freshman in college and was introduced to the poetry of Ferlinghetti and some of the "Beat" writers.  I even became a lifetime member of a short-lived coffee house called "The Outside."  


City Lights lived up to my expectations--how often does THAT happen?  My significant other, my son and I all bought books.  Guess what one of my selections was?  Proust's Overcoat.  Written by Italian journalist and writer Lorenza Foschini and translated by Eric Karpeles of Paintings In Proust authorship,


I read Proust's Overcoat on the long flight home, and found it enchanting.  It is the story of one man's obsession with Proust and his effort to salvage Proust's writing and possessions after his death.    Obsession can be a good thing.   


Some nights I do read a few pages of Cities of the Plain and am enjoying it.  The Verdurin's dinner parties are somehow livelier than the Guermantes, don't you think?  And the little band of girls continues to  intrigue us as the narrator spends another summer at Balbec. 


Do pick up a copy of Proust's Overcoat.  Unlike his masterpiece, this book is 128 pages, some of them photos.  You won't still be reading it six months from now.  Hmmm.  Is that a good thing or a bad thing? 


Odette