Here's another blogger commenting on Albertine. It must be her week.
I'm wondering if she's the Proustian equivalent of "what do women want?" What does Albertine want? She seems always to be "the other," mysterious and elusive.
On the other hand, maybe she wanted to remain a girl in a beach town, riding bicycles with her friends and flirting with the tourist boys. Maybe she did not want the responsibility of finding a suitable husband and taking on married life. Who was Albertine?
Read this blog for more thoughts: http://delta-november.livejournal.com/93031.html
and may we congratulator the writer for completing four volumes?
I am limping through volume III.
Odette, the other one
Monday, September 22, 2008
Sunday, September 21, 2008
Onscreen Scientist Summarizes Proust
Finally a most worthy post apropos Proust from "Onscreen Scientist," who has completed a second reading of Proust in French, and has also completed the work in English.
My hat is off to him, for several reasons. He is a physicist and a software writer. In another lifetime, I wrote software for a living, and with a few exceptions, this was not a literary crowd. I cannot think of any of my software colleagues who would have read Proust and my conjecture is that few of them would have even known who he was. Perhaps the scientist writes AI software or something besides grinding out business transactions ad nauseum ad infinitum.
I have known a few literary physics majors, most of the professors. I think physics teaches a certain curiosity about the world--well all science should do that except maybe creationism, which is of course not science but pseudo-science like astrology and phrenology and Madame Sostirus, cardreader and fortuneteller. I know people who actually believe this stuff.
But back to Proust. Onscreen Scientist offers a great summation of the book--a bit longer than those in the All England Summarize Proust Contest, and I think he is dead on about Albertine. One just cannot ever quite get a handle on her. She remains, for me, too, a tabula rasa.
Currently, I am wallowing in Mme. Villeparisis' endless party, and in two days I leave for Northern Nevada, a wonderful place for reading Proust but I only travel there with softcovers I can leave behind, and of course, that would not be Proust.
So click ye forth and read Onscreen Scientist's Proust post, and then hie ye to Proust himself, the great one. I was an the New England Independent Booksellers Association Trade Show yesterday and scooped up a wonderful bunch of books.
When people say they don't read, I feel an awful sympathy. How could you not read?
After all, Onscreen Scientists reads the master in French. Zowie!
http://onscreen-scientist.com/?p=35
Odette, the other one
My hat is off to him, for several reasons. He is a physicist and a software writer. In another lifetime, I wrote software for a living, and with a few exceptions, this was not a literary crowd. I cannot think of any of my software colleagues who would have read Proust and my conjecture is that few of them would have even known who he was. Perhaps the scientist writes AI software or something besides grinding out business transactions ad nauseum ad infinitum.
I have known a few literary physics majors, most of the professors. I think physics teaches a certain curiosity about the world--well all science should do that except maybe creationism, which is of course not science but pseudo-science like astrology and phrenology and Madame Sostirus, cardreader and fortuneteller. I know people who actually believe this stuff.
But back to Proust. Onscreen Scientist offers a great summation of the book--a bit longer than those in the All England Summarize Proust Contest, and I think he is dead on about Albertine. One just cannot ever quite get a handle on her. She remains, for me, too, a tabula rasa.
Currently, I am wallowing in Mme. Villeparisis' endless party, and in two days I leave for Northern Nevada, a wonderful place for reading Proust but I only travel there with softcovers I can leave behind, and of course, that would not be Proust.
So click ye forth and read Onscreen Scientist's Proust post, and then hie ye to Proust himself, the great one. I was an the New England Independent Booksellers Association Trade Show yesterday and scooped up a wonderful bunch of books.
When people say they don't read, I feel an awful sympathy. How could you not read?
After all, Onscreen Scientists reads the master in French. Zowie!
http://onscreen-scientist.com/?p=35
Odette, the other one
Monday, September 15, 2008
Better Than Any Ambien
Yesterday was an early to rise day, and we watched "Mad Men," and finally at 11:30 I climbed into bed. Tried to read a little more of the endless reception in The Guermantes Way. Before I was through a page, yea, even a paragraph (we know M.P. can write ultra-long paragraphs) I had the sensation of eyes closing, page unread, and into dreamland it was.
Not the first time this has happened. Will I ever finish The Guermantes Way?
One blogger has issues with The Prisoner, which I know as The Captive. If confessions are in order, I admit that I always found this one of the more tedious volumes of the novel. Tedious the max.
On starting Proust’s Prisoner:
http://gaiawriter.blogspot.com/2008/09/starting-marcel-prousts-prisoner.html
Here is another blogger's response:
Thoughts from Proust, AKA a “Frenchman.”
http://www.mindblink.org/2008/09/thoughts-from-frenchman-oui.html
I am going to survive Mme. Villeparisis party eventually. I think.
Odette, who showed up at the reception and spoke to Marcel who was rather tongue-tied.
Not the first time this has happened. Will I ever finish The Guermantes Way?
One blogger has issues with The Prisoner, which I know as The Captive. If confessions are in order, I admit that I always found this one of the more tedious volumes of the novel. Tedious the max.
On starting Proust’s Prisoner:
http://gaiawriter.blogspot.com/2008/09/starting-marcel-prousts-prisoner.html
Here is another blogger's response:
Thoughts from Proust, AKA a “Frenchman.”
http://www.mindblink.org/2008/09/thoughts-from-frenchman-oui.html
I am going to survive Mme. Villeparisis party eventually. I think.
Odette, who showed up at the reception and spoke to Marcel who was rather tongue-tied.
Wednesday, September 10, 2008
Conflict Moves Life, Not Just the Plot
To catch up, read my prior post about conflict in writing and how important it is.
Someone in my writing group mentioned that we spend our lives trying to avoid conflict, and attempting to live a serene existence, and then as writers we really set the pot to boiling, and how different is the way we (most of us) want to live versus what we must put down on paper.
Of course, in the literary world there are notable exceptions such as Hemingway and Mailer and Fitzgerald and Hunter Thompson. Hmmm. These are all men. Maybe it is women who want the quieter life, like Virginia Wolfe and Emily Dickenson. I wonder if this would make a good topic for a Ph. D. thesis.
If so, take it forth, because I won't be writing any theses.
More of the party at Mme. Villeparisis: I'm beginning to think this whole volume about the Guermantes takes place there. The very conflicted Charlus appears at this party. We'll see much more of him later.
Here's a blogger with good intentions who hasn't quite made it that far into the novel yet. The mention of Proust's translator, Lydia Davis, caught my eye. The blogger doesn't like her book, and mentioned some male authors, and that got me going on the contemplative life versus the life of action.
http://dahlhaus.blogspot.com/2008/09/books-end-of-story-by-lydia-davis.html
In another blog, I'm forever telling readers to go forth into the world and look around. That's not the same thing as being engagé, the existential idea of being engaged in life. Are there any existentialists left? I never see any mention, but perhaps I read the wrong periodicals. Perhaps they still haunt left bank cafes.
What amazes me is that the scene at the party goes on for hundreds of pages. And that's also how novel ends, at another party, years later.
If you write, you understand how difficult it is to juggle party scenes, because the intermingling of many people is hard to convey, and it's easy to confuse the reader and botch up the scene. Three or four way conversations become impossible with attribution and focus. Proust does an excellent job--of conveying the party, not of botching the scene. My admiration for Proust increases the longer I write. What a master!
If you are a trifle Proust-challenged, and who isn't, here is a cool web site that can be your character guide. Who's Who in Proust. How cool is that?
http://www.whoswhoinproust.com/
Someone in my writing group mentioned that we spend our lives trying to avoid conflict, and attempting to live a serene existence, and then as writers we really set the pot to boiling, and how different is the way we (most of us) want to live versus what we must put down on paper.
Of course, in the literary world there are notable exceptions such as Hemingway and Mailer and Fitzgerald and Hunter Thompson. Hmmm. These are all men. Maybe it is women who want the quieter life, like Virginia Wolfe and Emily Dickenson. I wonder if this would make a good topic for a Ph. D. thesis.
If so, take it forth, because I won't be writing any theses.
More of the party at Mme. Villeparisis: I'm beginning to think this whole volume about the Guermantes takes place there. The very conflicted Charlus appears at this party. We'll see much more of him later.
Here's a blogger with good intentions who hasn't quite made it that far into the novel yet. The mention of Proust's translator, Lydia Davis, caught my eye. The blogger doesn't like her book, and mentioned some male authors, and that got me going on the contemplative life versus the life of action.
http://dahlhaus.blogspot.com/2008/09/books-end-of-story-by-lydia-davis.html
In another blog, I'm forever telling readers to go forth into the world and look around. That's not the same thing as being engagé, the existential idea of being engaged in life. Are there any existentialists left? I never see any mention, but perhaps I read the wrong periodicals. Perhaps they still haunt left bank cafes.
What amazes me is that the scene at the party goes on for hundreds of pages. And that's also how novel ends, at another party, years later.
If you write, you understand how difficult it is to juggle party scenes, because the intermingling of many people is hard to convey, and it's easy to confuse the reader and botch up the scene. Three or four way conversations become impossible with attribution and focus. Proust does an excellent job--of conveying the party, not of botching the scene. My admiration for Proust increases the longer I write. What a master!
If you are a trifle Proust-challenged, and who isn't, here is a cool web site that can be your character guide. Who's Who in Proust. How cool is that?
http://www.whoswhoinproust.com/
Odette, the other one
Friday, September 05, 2008
I Just Love a Good Proust Pun
Look what the web brought me this morning:
The chickens have come home to Proust!
http://wwidsith.livejournal.com/60734.html
Last night I continued reading (this is taking the entire summer) Mme. Villeparisis' party.
Robert St. Loup en Bray's mother has appeared, and the hostess has warned the Duchesse of Guermantes that Swann's wife Odette, shunned by the Dutchess, will make an appearance. Block has disgraced himself and tout le monde talks of the Dreyfuss affair. Odette has become an anti-Dreyfussard. (Sorry if I mangled the spelling.)
In my attempt to write, I have learned that conflict moves the plot. It moves Proust's masterpiece, slowly, lentement, so be sure, but conflict there is. Between the boy, the mother and the father in the opening pages. Internal conflict. Conflict with the servants, Tante Leonie, Swann and Odette, the narrator and Gilberte. And so on. Did someone mention Albertine?
Conflict rules, but cripes, this reception is sooooo long. Not boring, really, but I can only read a few pages before bedtime. Can't wait until Odette show up.
Onward,
Odette, the other one
The chickens have come home to Proust!
http://wwidsith.livejournal.com/60734.html
Last night I continued reading (this is taking the entire summer) Mme. Villeparisis' party.
Robert St. Loup en Bray's mother has appeared, and the hostess has warned the Duchesse of Guermantes that Swann's wife Odette, shunned by the Dutchess, will make an appearance. Block has disgraced himself and tout le monde talks of the Dreyfuss affair. Odette has become an anti-Dreyfussard. (Sorry if I mangled the spelling.)
In my attempt to write, I have learned that conflict moves the plot. It moves Proust's masterpiece, slowly, lentement, so be sure, but conflict there is. Between the boy, the mother and the father in the opening pages. Internal conflict. Conflict with the servants, Tante Leonie, Swann and Odette, the narrator and Gilberte. And so on. Did someone mention Albertine?
Conflict rules, but cripes, this reception is sooooo long. Not boring, really, but I can only read a few pages before bedtime. Can't wait until Odette show up.
Onward,
Odette, the other one
Monday, September 01, 2008
Total Proust
How did I miss this Proust blog? Because it's a few years old, no doubt, but with Proust, unlike politics or popular culture old is good.
http://letempsdeproust.blogsome.com/
There are some old but good writings about Proust in the following books:
Axel's Castle by Edmund Wilson
Studies in Human Time by Georges Poulet
No idea if they are in print or re-issued. My copies are as old as the hills. Undoubtedly there are more modern takes, but I left literature and entered technology, and therein lies a tale.
Odette
http://letempsdeproust.blogsome.com/
There are some old but good writings about Proust in the following books:
Axel's Castle by Edmund Wilson
Studies in Human Time by Georges Poulet
No idea if they are in print or re-issued. My copies are as old as the hills. Undoubtedly there are more modern takes, but I left literature and entered technology, and therein lies a tale.
Odette
Saturday, August 16, 2008
A Proust Blog from Laura-Les-Crayons
Lately, not only has my reading of Proust been sort of la-di-dah, but the interesting Proust blogs have dried up for the summer.
Today, I found a singular one, on the topic (mostly) of a Proust lecture. The blogger is a young lady who lives in Paris. I had just been reading the Paris September Gourmet, and recalling our trip of a year and a half ago, or was it two? Anyway, everything converged in delightful serendipity.
http://laura-les-crayons.blogspot.com/
Love the name. Have to confess mega-envy over young women living in Paris. Sigh. Ah well, I can cook something French and get out the French linens and some vin rouge and pretend our deck overlooking the slough is a balcon en Paris. Nice, n'est pas? The chickadees and blackbirds can become pigeons and the slough can be the Seine.
Odette
Today, I found a singular one, on the topic (mostly) of a Proust lecture. The blogger is a young lady who lives in Paris. I had just been reading the Paris September Gourmet, and recalling our trip of a year and a half ago, or was it two? Anyway, everything converged in delightful serendipity.
http://laura-les-crayons.blogspot.com/
Love the name. Have to confess mega-envy over young women living in Paris. Sigh. Ah well, I can cook something French and get out the French linens and some vin rouge and pretend our deck overlooking the slough is a balcon en Paris. Nice, n'est pas? The chickadees and blackbirds can become pigeons and the slough can be the Seine.
Odette
Sunday, August 10, 2008
Madam Verdurin
A blogger with a take on one of Proust's great characters, Mme. Verdurin.
http://bestofnow.blogspot.com/
And another blogger must be reading about the same party that I am. Pages and pages. Show don't tell. Well, maybe sometimes telling would not be a totally bad thing.
http://delta-november.livejournal.com/91240.html
Didn't take Proust to Chicago. Too tired to read most nights, due to overly large dinners with overly much wine and spirits. Lovely, just not conducive to a long read before bedtime.
Odette
http://bestofnow.blogspot.com/
And another blogger must be reading about the same party that I am. Pages and pages. Show don't tell. Well, maybe sometimes telling would not be a totally bad thing.
http://delta-november.livejournal.com/91240.html
Didn't take Proust to Chicago. Too tired to read most nights, due to overly large dinners with overly much wine and spirits. Lovely, just not conducive to a long read before bedtime.
Odette
Friday, August 01, 2008
Les Vacances
Your faithful Odette is off to Chicago for a week. Alas, it's not Balbec and certainly not Nantucket or Easthampton or any of the stylish places.
Puzzle for you: If Proust lived here today, where would he take his holidays? Perhaps the Riviera, not on the beach but high above the coast approached by a steep corniche, where the view in marvelous and the food equally fine. Art galleries and patrons nearby. A bit of shopping, but not too much. Girls in bikinis with sportscars, not bicycles. How it all has changed.
It would be nice to be in Nice. Instead, the windy city on the hottest week of the year.
Ah well,
Odette
Puzzle for you: If Proust lived here today, where would he take his holidays? Perhaps the Riviera, not on the beach but high above the coast approached by a steep corniche, where the view in marvelous and the food equally fine. Art galleries and patrons nearby. A bit of shopping, but not too much. Girls in bikinis with sportscars, not bicycles. How it all has changed.
It would be nice to be in Nice. Instead, the windy city on the hottest week of the year.
Ah well,
Odette
Wednesday, July 30, 2008
The Duke and the Duchesse
I picked up Proust again, and read and read and am still at Mme. Villeparisis party with Marcel and Bloch and the hostess and the Duke and the Duchesse of Guermantes. The Duke (Basin) arrived and manuevered through the drawing room with his hand held out at his side "like a shark's fin." What a great image. Of course the couple didn't arrive together. She is furious about his infidelities, as naturally a proud duchesse would be. He is still handsome. Oriane and Basin. What a couple.
What a masterful writer! And how the Duchesse disses St. Loup's (her nephew's) mistress. It's interesting how we get various sides, wholly opposite of the mistress/actress. She is dumb. She is smart. She is pretty. She is ugly. She can act. She can't. Hmmm. What is going on here?
And good old Bloch is as clueless as ever, and we find out who Mme. Villeparisis love is, in a clever aside by the author.
I like it ever so much, and even if I only read a page or two (and who can claim to have raced through Proust?) it's well worth while.
I may take the book on vacation with me. A car trip, and therefore a thick hardcover is not such a liability.
So, children, I haven't posted because I tend my garden, and have begun a new novel, not what I expected to write, au contraire, and we had houseguests and dinner guests, and well, yanno, pretty soon the weeks have taken wing and here we are in eeek, August, the month of Vacances.
When all the Paris restaurants are ferme. Mon Dieu. But not Chicago restaurants. I noticed, in a persusal of the guidebook, that Chicago has many more French restaurants than Boston, where French cuisine is practically an endangered species. O.K., there's a few. Damn few. Boston is for seafood and Italian and whatever.
Of course the guidebook stated some pretty eye-popping prices. Better to be at the little evenings of the Verdurins, or better yet, much better, at Balbec on the beach, in the hotel dining room, at one's fixed table, and bicycling with the little band. Ah! Summer!
Odette
What a masterful writer! And how the Duchesse disses St. Loup's (her nephew's) mistress. It's interesting how we get various sides, wholly opposite of the mistress/actress. She is dumb. She is smart. She is pretty. She is ugly. She can act. She can't. Hmmm. What is going on here?
And good old Bloch is as clueless as ever, and we find out who Mme. Villeparisis love is, in a clever aside by the author.
I like it ever so much, and even if I only read a page or two (and who can claim to have raced through Proust?) it's well worth while.
I may take the book on vacation with me. A car trip, and therefore a thick hardcover is not such a liability.
So, children, I haven't posted because I tend my garden, and have begun a new novel, not what I expected to write, au contraire, and we had houseguests and dinner guests, and well, yanno, pretty soon the weeks have taken wing and here we are in eeek, August, the month of Vacances.
When all the Paris restaurants are ferme. Mon Dieu. But not Chicago restaurants. I noticed, in a persusal of the guidebook, that Chicago has many more French restaurants than Boston, where French cuisine is practically an endangered species. O.K., there's a few. Damn few. Boston is for seafood and Italian and whatever.
Of course the guidebook stated some pretty eye-popping prices. Better to be at the little evenings of the Verdurins, or better yet, much better, at Balbec on the beach, in the hotel dining room, at one's fixed table, and bicycling with the little band. Ah! Summer!
Odette
Friday, July 11, 2008
The Best Proust Birthday Present
This blogger (see link below) has a fab photo of madelines and a glass a wine, never mind the tea.
Hmmm. When I was an undergrad at a Texas school, we always referred to U of T students as "tea sips." This was a huge insult, and in fact when I hear someone ordering a soy latte with no caffeine, the word "tea sip" always comes to mind, as with any wimpy talk, like "I could never drink wine with lunch," eat, butter, bacon, fried food, strong coffee, any number of wimp-outs. Kierkegaard said, "Sin bravely."
Proust was no wimp either, in spite of his poor health. I think of him tramping around St. Loup's barracks, and through town and hiking along the paths of Balbec.
Here is the link to the Birthday Present. Cool blog, too.
http://www.thebunnybungalow.com/2008/07/joyeux-anniversaire-monsieur-proust.html
Grapeshot
Hmmm. When I was an undergrad at a Texas school, we always referred to U of T students as "tea sips." This was a huge insult, and in fact when I hear someone ordering a soy latte with no caffeine, the word "tea sip" always comes to mind, as with any wimpy talk, like "I could never drink wine with lunch," eat, butter, bacon, fried food, strong coffee, any number of wimp-outs. Kierkegaard said, "Sin bravely."
Proust was no wimp either, in spite of his poor health. I think of him tramping around St. Loup's barracks, and through town and hiking along the paths of Balbec.
Here is the link to the Birthday Present. Cool blog, too.
http://www.thebunnybungalow.com/2008/07/joyeux-anniversaire-monsieur-proust.html
Grapeshot
Thursday, July 10, 2008
They're Still Summarizing Proust
Personally, I haven't ever tried to summarize Proust but I did write an English paper in my senior year which must have done some summarizing--Proust and time, what a topic--at 21 I was obsessed with time, duree (yeah, I know the apostrophe is missing) and all this terribly pretentious literary stuff.
Life was interesting in those days. But back to Proust, whose birthday was yesterday, by the way. Happy Birthday, Marcel, wherever you are.
Here is a link to an interesting post that links to some summaries of Proust on another website. This all started with the Monty Python All England Summarize Proust Contest, which was one of their classics. God, was that program great. Spam, spam, spam, baked beans, egg, tomato and spam. We quote from it all the time.
Link: http://lilliputreview.blogspot.com/2008/07/wendell-berry-madam-marie-and-summarize.html
Maybe you should write your own summary.
Odette, no not that one!
Life was interesting in those days. But back to Proust, whose birthday was yesterday, by the way. Happy Birthday, Marcel, wherever you are.
Here is a link to an interesting post that links to some summaries of Proust on another website. This all started with the Monty Python All England Summarize Proust Contest, which was one of their classics. God, was that program great. Spam, spam, spam, baked beans, egg, tomato and spam. We quote from it all the time.
Link: http://lilliputreview.blogspot.com/2008/07/wendell-berry-madam-marie-and-summarize.html
Maybe you should write your own summary.
Odette, no not that one!
Tuesday, July 08, 2008
Proust Errata
Blogging Proust in his various permutations.
Jacqui’s room: 15 Classics in 15 weeks.
http://jacquirobbins.blogspot.com/2008/07/july-7-book-by-proust.html
What ambition. I am astounded. Can barely get through the newspapers and magazines that come into the house.
Proust for the 3rd Time. This is what I’m doing. Once as an undergrad, 15 years later as a suburban mom (no soccer) and now with grown children. Each age brings something to Proust. Now I’m enjoying his humor, which I totally missed the first two reads. How is this possible?
http://bestofnow.blogspot.com/2008/07/shadowed-agapanthus-proust.html
Seven Degrees of Separation from
http://gayethechainreader.blogspot.com/2008/07/seven-degrees-of-separation-from-proust.html
Type in an author and see who else comes up. Weird names, for sure.
http://www.gnooks.com/
Jacqui’s room: 15 Classics in 15 weeks.
http://jacquirobbins.blogspot.com/2008/07/july-7-book-by-proust.html
What ambition. I am astounded. Can barely get through the newspapers and magazines that come into the house.
Proust for the 3rd Time. This is what I’m doing. Once as an undergrad, 15 years later as a suburban mom (no soccer) and now with grown children. Each age brings something to Proust. Now I’m enjoying his humor, which I totally missed the first two reads. How is this possible?
http://bestofnow.blogspot.com/2008/07/shadowed-agapanthus-proust.html
Seven Degrees of Separation from
http://gayethechainreader.blogspot.com/2008/07/seven-degrees-of-separation-from-proust.html
Type in an author and see who else comes up. Weird names, for sure.
http://www.gnooks.com/
Saturday, July 05, 2008
Blogging Proust
Photo is the beach at BiarritzBy now (July 5th) Marcel would be at Balbec with his grandmother, enjoying sun, sea and the girls in flower.
If you have a true Proust voracity, here are two blogs worthy of mention.
Proust and Penelope
http://lettersfromalibrarian.blogspot.com/2008/07/more-on-proust.html
Swann’s Way after 35 Years
http://thewritingsofproust.blogspot.com/2008/07/end-of-era.html
Odette
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