Here is the link to her newspaper column.
http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/books/reviews/book-of-a-lifetime-in-search-of-lost-time-marcel-proust-804348.html
I liked what she said about Proust readers being an enthusiastic but democratic group. The more I learn, the more amazing how wide-spread, far-flung and democratic we are.
Maybe there should be a Proust handshake, or a Proust greeting? No, that would be too kludgy, to use an IT term, but it bothers me a bit to think I may be meeting people and not realize they are also Proust fans. It's not an easy thing to drop into a casual conversation.
"Ready any Proust, lately?"
The normal comeback might be "Huh?"
Alas.
And I do remember the Duchesse de Guermantes red shoes. Isn't it cool how Proust really individuated some many characters? The Guermantes humor? Francoise, Charlus, the narrator's father?
One can go on and on. Even the waiter in Balbec.
Love it.
Toujours,
Odette
Showing posts with label French Society. Show all posts
Showing posts with label French Society. Show all posts
Friday, April 04, 2008
Wednesday, March 19, 2008
Reading Proust Again
Still working my way through the ways and wiles and sorrows of Madame de Villeparisis. Our narrator is at her reception with Bloch and the term "bluestocking" is in use. I wonder what the original French word was.
Lots of talk about rising and falling in society, with veiled speculation that the fallen ladies are perhaps just that, those who in their youth committed indiscretions that can't be forgiven. This topic of the social fall of Mme. Villeparisis and three of her cronies has been going on for page after page. Nonetheless, it's interesting, and Proust remarks that if she were "in society," she wouldn't have time for her memoirs and the social lions or course are too busy at dinner parties and balls and receptions to have time for memoir, so in this case, history is written, so to speak, by the loosers, not the victors. How subtle of Proust to have noticed that. The man is a genius.
From Wikipedia: Bluestocking
Bluestocking is a disparaging term, no longer in common use, for an educated, intellectual woman. 'Bluestocking' may also refer to:
Bluestockings (bookstore)
Bluestockings Journal
Blue Stockings Society (England), a women's movement based on the French movement
Lots of talk about rising and falling in society, with veiled speculation that the fallen ladies are perhaps just that, those who in their youth committed indiscretions that can't be forgiven. This topic of the social fall of Mme. Villeparisis and three of her cronies has been going on for page after page. Nonetheless, it's interesting, and Proust remarks that if she were "in society," she wouldn't have time for her memoirs and the social lions or course are too busy at dinner parties and balls and receptions to have time for memoir, so in this case, history is written, so to speak, by the loosers, not the victors. How subtle of Proust to have noticed that. The man is a genius.
From Wikipedia: Bluestocking
Bluestocking is a disparaging term, no longer in common use, for an educated, intellectual woman. 'Bluestocking' may also refer to:
Bluestockings (bookstore)
Bluestockings Journal
Blue Stockings Society (England), a women's movement based on the French movement
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