Proust on film

I saw the dramatization of Proust's last "book" in Cambridge, MA several years ago.  Catherine Deneuve played Odette, a casting that would never have occurred to me.  The film was quite good. There were no car chases, no explosions, no blood and gore, and I don't think there was a seventeen year old in the house.  Just a hushed, reverent audience. 

Here is a link to an NYTimes article about the man who created the film. A Mild Mannered Maniac. 


The last volume of the great tome is, to my mind, the best, and I found the great denouement utterly thrilling. 


The Other Odette

The Funniest Man in Paris

The humor in Proust is always surprising and sometimes barbed but often rather diffident.  I totally missed it in my first two passes through the great Oeuvre.  Here is a blogger who didn't miss a thing.  The Verdurins certainly come in for their share of having fun poked at them.  Jeez, sometimes you really have to jump through hoops to avoid ending a sentence with a preposition.

The Funniest Man in Paris

Eating Madelines in Seattle

Or how about a petite madeline with a cuppa tea in Paris?  On the subject of madelines, I must confess that I've had the molds for ever so long, but have yet to screw up my courage to actually make some.  I think this is because I read a recipe saying you must only make enough batter to fill the madeline molds in one baking session, because the batter absolutely did not keep for a second batch an hour or so later.

Seemed like a difficult task with  a high rate of failure.  One of these days I'll throw caution to the wind and whip up a batch.  Take a photo.  Let you know how they are.  I do not expect a Proustian experience, no that would come with my grandma's fried chicken or tomatoes from the garden.  Maybe her strawberry jam.   It would only be something my grandma cooked.  She never used a recipe and her short pudgy fingers moved so deftly, whether she was making bread or flouring a frying chicken.

Here is the article from the Seattle paper.  And many of us have read Proust, multiple times, in English and French and for all I know maybe Croation.  Eating Madelines with Proust in Seattle

Sleeping With Proust - Or Not

Last night, tired after returning from a literary soiree, I headed to bed early, and discovered my trusty Kindle was still downstairs, as was the book we bought at the party.  And this week's New Yorker.  Grrrr.


Good old Proust was still on the nightstand, with its (perhaps) mouse-nibbled cover.  I remembered that I had left off at the Verdurin's dinner party at Raspelier, over-looking the coast and not far from Balbec where Proust often spent part of the summer.  This is Cities of the Plain.


Charlus prefers strawberry juice to  orangeade, both homemade by Madame Verdurin's esteemed cook, no doubt.  By the way he makes his choice, the narrator notes the Baron's preference for men over woman and speculates that he's a woman in a man's body.  Wow!  Was Proust ever ahead of his time!   Transgender stuff.  The Baron goes on to make a fool of Madame Verdurin, not a terribly difficult thing to do.  She's such a fraud and a social climber and manipulative to the max, one of these great characters that we love to hate.  I nodded off after a half-dozen pages, which I would have done with even the most hair-raising thriller, so don't blame Proust.  Tired is tired.  And I like it ever so much.   I am tempted to get Proust on the Kindle, too.  


If you are a Proust scholar (I am not, alas)  or  take an interest in literary studies, I have the monograph for you. http://muse.jhu.edu/journals/new_literary_history/summary/v042/42.1.lurz.html

Back in the day, when I had perhaps ambitions to be a scholar, I would have dived into this.   At least Proust and I are in synch in that it is summer in Balbec and summer in Foxborough, although the rains and cool weather are more spring-like.  The calendar says summer.  Now do I want Orangeade or Strawberry Juice?  Hmmmm. 


Odette, the Other One

Pondering Proust in Montgomeryville, PA

A newspaperman in Montgomeryville, PA found a great column piece when he ordered a little package of madelines at the local coffee shop. Ya just never know!

Proust Inspires a Column  

I did like his answers to the quiz, which normally I don't, but these had the right amount of insouciance. 


Odette, the other one

Proust in The Park and the Proust Support Group

Some nice photos and observations:


  Proust in the Park 

And if you live near Venice, no not THAT Venice, you may want to join the Proust Support Group.

  Proust Support Group

Proust Anecdote

Good morning, readers!  It's 10:55 a.m. in Foxborough, and for the first time in weeks, the sun is shining.  I got so excited I cooked steak and eggs for breakfast, hoping that will see us through the day.  The orange cat is patrolling the house, hoping to sneak out and bag a chipmunk or two.
 The Huffington Post review of the new movie that premiered at the Cannes Film Festival (Tree of Life) has a fun Proust anecdote.  Read down a few paragraphs and you'll find it.  Movie sounds wonderful.  How often can one actually say that?

Me?  I am trying to catch up on this season's Treme, which is so good, and I love the multiple story lines that converge and diverge.  Kind of like Proust. 

I'm almost finished with my Traveler's Tales of Spain book, and ready to dive into the narrator's problems again, and everyone is at Balbec, so the reading will even be seasonal.  


Here is the link: 

Fun Proust Anecdote 

Odette 

Reading Proust in Minneapolis

Proust has done it again!  He's listed in the top 10 books of all time.   These are all novels except for one short story collection, by the way, and the list has strengthened my resolve to read Middlemarch,  the only book on the list I haven't read. I'm finishing a book of Traveler's Tales of Spain, as we are visiting there before the end of the year.

It's been a week for azaleas and rhododendrons (not hawthorns) here in Massachusetts.  Rains every day and we see the sun only rarely.  Today, as least was warm and I was able to weed the garden.   The narrator would still be bundled up in coats and scarves.  Perhaps I put the winter coats, gloves and scarves away prematurely.   

 Here is the link to the best books:

Top 10 Books of All Time

Odette

Fortuny and Proust Revisted

Fortuny Dress

Photographe à Dublin  has reminded me  of the relationship  of Fortuny and Proust.  A Google search has provided the following links.  Google is actually supposed to be sending me Proust links, but the well has dried up lately and my reading of Proust has been temporarily suspended due to lots of projects at home and an upcoming trip to Spain and Portugal which requires some in depth reading about those two countries.  The nice thing about Proust is that you can pick up the book after long intervals and come right back into the story.  I left my friends in La Raspeliere and now as summer approaches (here in New England it seems to be a long time coming) I will try to return to the narrator and his mild adventures. 


Here are the Fortuny links.  When I traveled to Venice, I had no idea there was a Fortuny museum there, alas.  Venice, like Paris, was one of those cities which lived up to its billing.  San Francisco always has, as well.  Without more ado,  some great Fortuny links, many with mentions of Proust. 
Mariano FORTUNY Y MADRAZO:     http://www.senses-artnouveau.com/biography.php?artist=FOR 

Fortuny in Wikipedia:   http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mariano_Fortuny_%28designer%29   

  Fortuny Museum in Venice: 

http://www.whattoseeinvenice.com/fortuny-museum-venice/  

The Fortuny gown: http://www.chick.net/proust/fortuny.html   

Fortuny museum photo:   http://www.flickr.com/photos/kevharb/3309836553/in/photostream/   

Proust Inspires Pulitzer Winner

Janet Egan's novel, A Visit From the Good Squad, inspired by Proust's great work, has been awarded the Pulitzer Prize.  Egan's novel, like Proust's is obsessed with time.  For all of us Proust People, this is an exciting day.  Congratulations to Egan on her stellar achievement. 


Read about it here: 
Egan Wins Pulitzer

Reading Proust in Arizona

Aside from the warm weather, this would be a good week for Proust fans to be in Arizona!  Hey, it's not all guns, cacti and canyons.  I love Arizona, the scenery and the sky and the warmth.  Here is the link: 


Proust in Arizona  


You find people celebrating Proust in the farthest corners.  Flagstaff as well as Foxborough.  Isn't it wonderful?   

I spent a fantastic week in Flagstaff at the Indian Powwow many many years ago, a week  I should write about.  The area around Flagstaff purportedly has mystical powers.  The peaks (San Francisco, I think, but memory is treacherous) are holy.  Sedona is so lovely it breaks your heart, all those red rocks, the high desert, the light, the possibilties.  

Odette 

Messing with the Classics

Nobody except the Monty Python gang messes with Proust, except respectfully.  Here is a stimulating article.  I am finding more and more good stuff in the Guardian. Update the classics at your own risk  


I don't think anything is actually "sacred" but of course bowdlerizing Mark Twain by removing the "N' word from Huck Finn and substituting "slave" is the height of wrong-mindedness.  Without television and radio and youtube and cell phone cameras and our new devices,  we only have first hand accounts and diaries revealing real speech.  And prudery in  revealing real speech and committing it to  paper and on film was a problem until the sixties when movies came of age and then HBO did it for television.  Can you imagine the Sopranos without the "F" word?  How did they speak in the wild west?  Building the railroads?  On the Erie Canal.   Did the Pony Express riders swear?  Did women?  Ever?  Who knows.


Occasionally Proust surprises us with some comment or sexual revelation, and it's so seldom one hardly knows what to think?   Ah, Marcel, you persist in puzzling me. 


Not being into so-called "celebrities," I have no idea who Jerry Hall is, but I do concur that she probably doesn't read Proust, at least in toto. We could pop over to Britain and give her a pop quiz on which reception was the most boring and on what was served as La Raspeliere at the Verdurin dinners.  Ha ha.  We all flunk. 

Should Proust be updated?  What a Gargantuan task that would be. 

Wondering, 

Odette  

Become Proust for a Week

This article tells you how to make the Proust tour of Normandy.  Had to admit I was practically drooling, mostly thinking of the oysters, but also the Proustian ambiance in every corner.  Imagine the grande  promenade and the sea views and examining (don't touch!) the tapestries  and driving a convertible and staying in the beloved hotels.  They're not even THAT pricey.  I am practically swooning as my imagination plays out a week like this.


Live Life of Proust for a Week  


Of course, you probably will need a stylish new wardrobe, but no Galliano, please.  Poor man.  It must have been the strain.  Silk and linen and organic  cottons will do, and if jeans, only the skinniest, priciest ones.  Good luggage, natch, maybe some vintage leather Hartmans.  Of course you have a doorman to carry, so wheels not necessary.   Some big wonderful sun glasses, and an old-fashioned wicker picnic hamper with all the accroutements.   How lovely to imagine.  I am just about ready to book my flight.

Vintage Leather Harmann luggage

And we absolutely must visit Elstir's studio.  Oh, alas, he's imaginary but a visit to Giverney will  be a good substitute.


Pack your (vintage) suitcase with some new duds and let's get out of here.  Mais oui!

Wine, Bread, Pate and fruit, n'est pas?

Odette, swooning

"Proust" concert in The Big Apple

Found on Craig's List, of all crazy things.  Alas, I can't be in New York on this date, but wouldn't it be inspiring to hear the musical works that inspired Proust?  And maybe even catch the "petite phrase" from the Sonata?


If you're a Proustian and in New York, go for it! 


Proust Concert in NYC 

Odette, the Foxborough one