/lit/ - Literature

bump

just look at that flossy motherfucker

get that dirt off your shoulder, marcel proust, because you look like a fucking pimp

>>2172499
You want a beautiful ending? Read Svartfugl by Gunnar Gunnarsson. That's the most beautiful ending I have ever seen.

Are you reading it in English or French?

I bought some michel houellebecq but I think I better read l'etranger or something easy before just plunging into heavy french.

>writing is so beautiful

I seriously hoe you're reading it in French.

fucking ay, my friend

Just wait until finish the entire series.

Also, I would highly, highly recommend Raoul Ruiz's adaptation of Time Regained. It won't ruin anything seeing it, but it's a great adaptation and he succeeds in filming Proust the only way Proust could or should be filmed.

Proust criticized film for not making the audience question the environment it presents (similar to Baudelaire's criticism of photography in relation to painting) and Ruiz does a perfect job showing just how the physical environment is constantly changing with regards to the narrator's (and by extension the viewer) mental state.

Bumping again.

The entire structure of the novel(s) both on the large and small scale and in relation to Proust's life is just so fucking brilliant and clever. It starts off with some thoughts on insomnia and then progresses towards a narrator who is actually on his death-bed writing to ward off death. Hence the long ass sentences, which function (similarly to the way Beckett uses banal chatter) to prolong time for the narrator and reader.

In the end Proust succeeds so well in doing exactly what OP is saying, chronicling thought and imagination that the narrator's recollections and by extension the novel itself becomes as real, if not more real, than life itself. One thing that almost everyone notes is how the narrator's own recollections trigger and recall the reader's own recollections. In the end, it's as if we have not only regained that lost time but increased it. Proust has allowed us to live longer and fuller. In novel in which life is like a dream and love is the biggest deception, Proust's regaining of time is one of the most beautiful deceptions literature has to offer.

If you're interested in some further reading I'd really recommend Beckett and Julia Kristeva on Proust. There was another great book I read partially, I forget the author, but it was mainly comparing Proust and Nietzsche, of whom Proust had never read. And there's also a great essay in another collection which contends that the narrator of the novel (only once or twice in all its million billion words referred to as 'Marcel') is actually something of a male lesbian.

This will become more clear once you're introduced to Albertine and their stormy relationship. But it's also a beautiful way of Proust to rewrite his own life and to universalize homosexuality or rather bisexuality (something which Shakespeare achieves in his sonnets and Twelfth Night and As You Like It). Proust was a gay and many critics read Albertine to be inspired by Proust's own lover Alfred Agostinelli, yet Proust makes his narrator, who is himself and not himself, a straight male, yet attracted and also most troubled by lesbian sexuality. When Proust was 18 or so, he wrote a questionnaire and in it he said that what he looks for most in a male companion are feminine charms and in a female companion, masculine virtues. Within heterosexuality there is homosexuality and vice versa.

Proust > Joyce. Come at me.

Joyce read Proust and initially thought it was nothing special but later he is said to have read him further and been really impressed and made the claim that Proust had taken psychology as far as it can go.

>>2172919
These posts are awesommmmmmeeeee

On the homosexuality tip: I'm mostly familiar with Proust (outside the books themselves) from what Hannah Arendt writes about him in her Origins of Totalitarianism where she uses him as the example of the nature of fin-de-siecle society and the fascination exerted upon it by the outcast/criminal type, prototypically the homosexual and the Jew, and the way in which this fascination was related to anti-Semitism. Interesting stuff & of course Proust is an excellent analyst of society and tracks this phenomenon closely.

I do think that comparing Proust & Joyce is misguided because they seem of very different eras even if they were publishing around the same time. Does that make sense?

>>2172974
Yeah it's pretty misguided. I've only read some of Dubliners (The Dead was amazing) and Molly's soliloquy, which is also amazing.

Proust was in part Jewish, yes? But I'm pretty sure he was baptized and never considered himself Jewish.

So I've been curious about psychology type writers, and I see Proust gains that reputation. Anyone else you would recommend? Dostoevsky is the only other writer I can think of who often take the title.

>>2173001
Ian McEwan's into all that.

>>2173001
Not exactly as inwardly psychological, but Flaubert's Sentimental Education was a big precursor to Proust. Shares the same kind of philosophy that one is most alive and happy when reading. To be more specific, when rereading, both your life and your book.

Dostoevsky is another good one of course. He's really inward. Tolstoy is a master of psychology but it's a different type. You know the characters so well and clearly but it's not the kind of 30 page digression about this one guy's current mental state, which I think is what you're after.

>>2173014
Hi, thanks for all your recommendations. I simply enjoy a reading that is focused on people and exploring what makes them tick. I have not read any Tolstoy, but I'm curious to read and see the sort of "psychology" you are talking about with his works. The only Tolstoy I've read was the Death of Ivan Ilych, but that was years ago and I've heard that novella comes from a heavily religious portion of his life.

>>2173011
I've never heard of the author but I'll look into him

>>2172499

You're just on an accomplishment high because you're well into Proust.

> mfw I've owned the grey edition of la Recherce for over a decade and I've never read it ;_;

I'm really interested in Proust, but I don't know where to start and what his aim was with his whole series/how it was divided/how many novels are in it.

Can someone just give me advice on where to start and some basic facts about him?

>>2173056

He was french and gay and wrote the longest, frenchest, gayest thing ever. You start at the base and make your way to the tip. What more is there to say?

>>2173060
Despite it's simplicity, your answer seems somewhat comprehensive in an odd way.

Thanks.

>>2173062
It's a fairly good answer actually...

>>2173056
read the fucking posts above, they address exactly what you want

Actually don't. You seem too fucking dense.

>>2173060
>mfw that post

>>2172919

I think that Nietzsche & Proust book was actually a phd thesis by someone at my uni, I remember skimming it once.

As far as reading Proust's characters as men instead of women cos he was gay etc. etc. etc. it's really lame, because it misses the entire point you should take from Proust, that fudamentally a lot of thought processes are really really similar, and so that he could write so accurately about love and yearning after girls you pass in the street for instance (which you'll see a lot of in volume 2) despite him being gay just shows there's nothing different about different sexualities when you get right down to it

>>2173117
That's exactly it. Reading all the girls and women as male characters misses the point! This pathetic experience is the universal experience. Proust is absolutely awesome.

>>2173001

Stendhal was the first great master/inventor of the psychological novel; in fact he basically invented all modern fiction. Very important precurssor to [insert any european realist who came after him] and his stuff has the added bonus of being crazy exciting adventure style as well. Charterhouse of Parma is more accessible, while The Red and The Black is (arguably) the better book overall.

"The fact is that homosexuality is a perennial adjunct of mammalian sexuality, neither a pathological condition nor a biological perversion. It has always existed, both among humans and among animals; and no doubt it always will exist. It cannot, of course, be cured, because it is not an illness in the first place...

...Why has the Freudian view of homosexuality persisted for so long in psychiatric circles and in popular opinion? Perhaps because it helps support, in the name of science, the social status quo. The onus of guilt in the Freudian drama of homosexuality consistently falls on a domineering mother, a detached father, or both at the same time. By portraying the assertive female as a symptom of incipient pathology, Freudianism neatly reinforces the sexual prejudices of Western society: in a healthy situation, according to psychoanalysis, the female is passive, not domineering. The Freudian view that healthy sexual development involves a teleological progress toward heterosexuality also lends obvious support to the cultural and moral biases of the Judaeo-Christian tradition."

-Proust & the art of love, J.E. Rivers

The next volume is my favourite...... the book in general is like a tv series that goes on and on and on and on, it's awesome.

>>2173001

The 18th century French moralists were really important. Also the french writer 'stendhal'

>>2173123
>>2173117
>>2173117
No doubt. I completely agree.

What I'm arguing is that Proust is a master at universalizing and rewriting his life. Nabokov got all pissy at the last half of In Lost Time because he thought that Albertine just amounted to Proust's own gay lover. I do not think Alfred is Albertine but I do think he saw within his own homosexuality something universal. Which I think echoes your point
> despite him being gay just shows there's nothing different about different sexualities when you get right down to it

I think the crucial thing is that the narrator 'Marcel' both is and is not Marcel. And the thing about the narrator as a male lesbian, is also a simplification. Proust complicates all of this and invites a lot of different readings.

>always pronounce it "Prowst"
>mfw I found out it was "Proost"

>>2173164

When a French housemate found out I was reading Prowst she laughed. Firstly because I pronounced it wrong. Secondly because Proost is supposedly a lot like the French word for fart.

>>2173164

Don't feel bad that's still how the English generally pronounce it.

OP someone already mentioned Sentimental Education but you'll also want to follow up with Sylvie by Gerard de Nerval. Are you reading the Montcreif translation? In French? That new one? Swann's Way was honestly very difficult for me to get into up until the last section because it began to very closely parallel with my own childhood and a girl I know. Where it really began to draw me in was book 3 though with the historical ramifications and prophetic depictions of the rise of anti-Semitism.

Not to mentions motherfucking Monsieur de Charlus. Just look at this motherfucker, holy shit. I hope your body can take it OP.

Good reading and be proud you're no longer one of those people who just talks about Proust.

>>2173188
Fuck I am stupid, forgot my image.

>>2173188
>>2173190
I read Swann's Way in the Montcrief because it's the copy I had available when I started. I'll see what the library has for the rest of it. I also want to see if I can't track down Lydia Davis' translation of Swann's Way, because I'm a big fan of Lydia Davis.

>>2173190
SWAG AS FUCK

>>2173264

based proust fucked my bitch

>>2172800
downloading the movie right now.

Also, OP, keep reading the book, it only gets better and better. Get ready for an epic ending in the final book. I'm re-reading the second volume right now, the first trip to Balbec, beautiful stuff.

so.... this is the kind of book that you have to read in its original language?

>>2173809
Not at all. Get your hands on a modern English translation

>>2173813
I'm a spanishfag, I would probably read it in Spanish, but thanks. I would give it a try..

anyway, do you recommend any particular translation?

There is nothing more hipster than liking Proust.

>>2173842

The earliest psychological novel is the Tale of Genji but it's probably worth picking up as more of a historical thing.

>>2173842
That's absolutely true. There's also nothing of merit from literature that is only in Proust. He takes the longest to have the least to say. Read only if you enjoy.

WHO THE FUCK WANTS A BEAUTIFUL ENDING.

I WANT SOMETHING THAT MAKES ME FEEL EMPTY INSIDE WHEN FINISHING IT, WITHOUT HOPE.

>>2174039
>There's also nothing of merit from literature that is only in Proust
>He takes the longest to have the least to say
You are a sad and short-sighted person.

>>2174056
No, I'm someone who recognizes a dozen pages on the lighting of a candle as a dozen pages on the lighting of a candle.

>>2174059
>proust is a bad writer because I don't like it
At least come with a better argument. You're that guy, they're calling hipster or troll.
(HINT: Read 'sandwiches' posts ITT and come with something similar if you can)

>>2174092
I did not say he was a bad writer and I do not regard him as such.

FFS, people who like Proust are the kind of people who like Infinite Jest or Finnegan's Wake.

Basically they're pseuds.

>>2174127
I THINK SOMEONE'S PROJECTING THEIR OWN PSEUDITY ON OTHERS HERE

I've got Swann's Way uploaded on my kindle and am going to try reading all of Remembrance of Things Past once I'm finished with Ulysses. Might as well read the best while you're alive, right?

>>2174127
Association fallacy.

Case dismissed.

ANYWAY I HAVE A QUESTION

IS THIS DIFFICULT TO READ IN FRENCH?

FUCK CAPS LOCK

because i want to read it in french but i never read a book in french in my life

>>2174127

so are you scifi/fantasy twerp or wizened-old-man-in-4channer's-body who wont read anything newer than dostoevsky

eitehr way lol i guess

>>2174132
I just read a review on Amazon. Judging from that, I expect it will be hard:

>
I recommend this edition of Proust, the translation is of very high standards. I believe that the complexity of the author's sentences and his challenging syntax are allowed to shine. Amazing manipulation of language, Proust was an extraordinarily educated man and the words chosen by Moncrieff and Kilmartin are so special, again they allow the airy and higly elaborated writing of Proust to manifest itself.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Search-Lost-Time-Vol-Classics/dp/009936221X/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=13202
50468&sr=8-1

>>2174137
well fuck me in the ass

i guess i'll read the fucking count of monte cristo first and when i'm done with that i'll try this mother

i wish i knew all the languages

>>2174132
for you and anyone else considering the french - it isn't nearly as bad as translations will lead you to believe. what comes into english as multi-clause rambling sentences are more often than not a series of simple statements separated by semicolons in the french. the vocab is precise but nowhere near as bad as flaubert for obscurity. you'll soon realize he has certain words and image groups he likes drawing on and it all becomes much easier. the only regular difficulties i find are in his descriptions of clothing - especially women's clothing - and art/architecture (e.g. elstir's painting and the cathedral at combray)

>>2174142
I studied German up to A level. I thought, "Ooh I know, I'll read some Kafka!"

It turned out to be way too hard for me. I swear there's too many newspaper articles and not nearly enough literature in the course. Feelsbadman.

Oh dead, too many pseuds in this thread trying to insist that the time they wasted on this series was books wasn't a massive bore and wasted effort.

>herp derp, critics say Proust is great they can't be wrong. >herp derp, really long sentences brilliant.
>herp derp, it's really old so must be really good

>>2174169

"hodor," said >>2174169

>>2173842
>>2174127
>>2174169

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uwAOc4g3K-g

>be a homosexual
>write sprawling ouvre encompassing the systematic dissection of the bourgeois
>or so it seems
>in reality it is a smokescreen masking fag propaganda
>faggotry amidst perceived literary quality?
>acceptance by association?
>im not bying it you fag
>go suck a dick

GOD HATES FAGS

>>2174228

There really is no use in hiding your trip satan, if you're going to use the same picture over and over.

who want what? who pumped up to get rolled up?

>>2174245
>saging a /lit/ thread
Why do you come to this board? Vade retro, faggot.

>>2174254

i bumped it once (when i addressed the topic) see>>2174228

unlike most people here, i actually know when it is appropriate to use sage

>>2174258
whateva, go make a pocket pussy >>>/diy/

>>2174264

of all the random replies...you chose that?
a pocket pussy? what the fuck lol