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A review by attytheresa
Remembrance of Things Past, Volume II: The Guermantes Way & Cities of the Plain by Marcel Proust
5.0
With this I am about 2/3rds of the way through my bucketlist read of A Remembrance of Things Past! I can see the end in the distance.
Book 3 Guermantes Way and Book 4 Sodom & Gomorrah represent the young narrator's entrée into the various segments of Belle Époque society, from the upper aristocracy just short of royalty down through the lower aristocracy, upper middle class, country vs. city, and of course salon culture. We also see his sexual maturity played out over a varied landscape including brothels and the demi-mondaine. We also see marriage enter his thoughts.
Frankly, the narrator is not necessarily likeable. In fact he is often a dick, extremely inconsiderate, spoiled, selfish. You wonder just why he is given entrée, even sought out by all these various members of society. This is where reading all those Regency romances pays off: the narrator is very wealthy, of good family, well-mannered, erudite, educated, eligible, single, good looking. Of course he is in demand!
Aside from the narrator, you get to know many others: the Duke and Duchesse de Guermantes, the Verdurins who have risen in the world since we first met them in Vol. I, the aging roué Baron de Charlus who has a taste for young male 'rough trade', and the lovely unknowable Albertine which is so very important to the narrator.
There are many joys in reading Proust. His social satire is masterful, colorful, lively. His portraiture is a series of jewels. He writes with great beauty and wit (the seduction of two aging homosexuals that alternates with descriptions of a rare orchid being fertilized by a bee - must be read to be believed). He also writes with great emotion (the death of the narrator's grandmother and his later grieving in Balbec when memories of her overwhelm him).
Proust can also be a beautiful slog. Especially when he goes off on his philosophical, etymological, historical, etc. discourses. But so worth it.
Book 3 Guermantes Way and Book 4 Sodom & Gomorrah represent the young narrator's entrée into the various segments of Belle Époque society, from the upper aristocracy just short of royalty down through the lower aristocracy, upper middle class, country vs. city, and of course salon culture. We also see his sexual maturity played out over a varied landscape including brothels and the demi-mondaine. We also see marriage enter his thoughts.
Frankly, the narrator is not necessarily likeable. In fact he is often a dick, extremely inconsiderate, spoiled, selfish. You wonder just why he is given entrée, even sought out by all these various members of society. This is where reading all those Regency romances pays off: the narrator is very wealthy, of good family, well-mannered, erudite, educated, eligible, single, good looking. Of course he is in demand!
Aside from the narrator, you get to know many others: the Duke and Duchesse de Guermantes, the Verdurins who have risen in the world since we first met them in Vol. I, the aging roué Baron de Charlus who has a taste for young male 'rough trade', and the lovely unknowable Albertine which is so very important to the narrator.
There are many joys in reading Proust. His social satire is masterful, colorful, lively. His portraiture is a series of jewels. He writes with great beauty and wit (the seduction of two aging homosexuals that alternates with descriptions of a rare orchid being fertilized by a bee - must be read to be believed). He also writes with great emotion (the death of the narrator's grandmother and his later grieving in Balbec when memories of her overwhelm him).
Proust can also be a beautiful slog. Especially when he goes off on his philosophical, etymological, historical, etc. discourses. But so worth it.