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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
13 of 13 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Painting Proust,
By James Lee (Melbourne Australia) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Marcel Proust: A Biography (Hardcover)
I feel obliged to preface any comments on Painter's biography with a cautionary word. Reading this book without having read Proust's masterpiece A la Recherche du Temps Perdu, is like reading a history of Jazz, without having heard any. That said, and disregarding Painter's introductory thesis that "Proust's novel cannot be fully undersood without a knowledge of his life", the life and times of Proust is a fascinating subject in itself. His genius for conversation, and the legacy it created for him, gives his biographer plenty to work with and Painter's skill as a writer comes to the fore as he recreates the events that shaped Proust's life. The biography is written sequentially, beginning with a brief overview of late 19th century Paris, and culminating in Proust's death while still revising his masterpiece, in November 1922. Footnotes a plenty, Painter avoids mythologising Proust and instead, sticks to the facts with an academic's eye for detail. He occasionally offers revealing insights into Proust's work and writes in a curious style which draws on Proust's own language and favourite metaphors. In the end though, Painter's raison d'etre is to identify the people and places that shaped Proust's writing. To this end, we meet the Barons, Dukes and Duchesses who populated the upper stratosphere of Parisian society in the early nineteen hundreds, and visit the small gardens of Illiers and Auteuil, which would eventually become the Combray of his famous novel. Not interested? Well this book is not for you. For those of you who are interested in knowing from where Proust's inspiration sprang, there is no better book. One for the fans.
4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Time's Lost and Found...,
By John P. Jones III (Albuquerque, NM, USA) - See all my reviews (VINE VOICE) (TOP 500 REVIEWER) (REAL NAME)
This review is from: Marcel Proust: A Biography (Hardcover)
Marcel Proust's classic work, was first translated into English by C.K. Scott Moncrieff, with a title, "Remembrance of Things Past," which is somewhat askew, from the literal translation of "In Search of Lost Time," particularly from the passive in English to the active verb in French. It is one of the most praised and least read literary masterpieces. Least read for a reason: it is one of the longest works, at 3,000 plus pages, and furthermore, much of the book concerns the arcane machinations of social climbers in the Parisian literary salons; a scene that has largely changed, at least by dropping the royalty monikers from today's "power brokers." So, if you are not reading and commenting on the book to promote your academic career, what is the point?
As the current only other reviewer says, you have to be interested. And fortunately for me, there were those aspects of Proust's work that provided the hook. The other reviewer also said it is essential to have read some of Proust before tackling this biography, and I hardily agree. I've read "Swann's Way," only roughly a sixth of the overall work, but it provided sufficient motivation to read all of Painter's 700 pages on Proust, even enough to struggle through the machinations in those Parisian salons. There is no question that Painter has conducted meticulous research, and has combined that with fluid prose to present what will almost certainly be the most authoritative biography of Proust. He had sufficient distance from his subject, completing it in 1959, almost 40 years after Proust's death, and has provided one more preface to this edition, 30 years later. He says of Proust's magnum opus that it is: "... the allegory of Proust's life, a work not of fiction but of imagination interpreting reality." Painter's own erudition repeatedly shines through in this work. Proust, though he did not have the English language skills, undertook to translate Ruskin's "The Bible of Amiens" into French. In this section Painter reminds us of a Ruskin doctrine: "reading is valuable because it is a conversation with men far wiser and more interesting than those we have the opportunity to meet in everyday life." Later, Painter quotes from a letter that Proust wrote, quoting Pascal, saying: "that all the misfortunes of man spring from his inability to live in a room alone!" Painter found an article written by a mathematician, Camille Vettard, entitled "Proust et Einstein." When Cremiux pointed out some anachronisms in "Le Cote de Guermantes," Proust wryly replied: "that they were due to the flattened form my characters take owing to their rotation in time." Proust was homosexual, one of the first novelist to openly proclaim this, and Painter says that the longest sentence he ever wrote, some 1500 words, was his confession of his homosexuality. Proust's father was a famous physician, one that promoted the idea of a "cordon sanitaire" that would effectively stop the spread of cholera. However, as Painter reports: "But the mingled admiration and contempt with which Proust treats the medical profession in "A la Recherche" is doubtless in part a reflection of his own feelings towards his father." The above are only just a small sampling of the rich observations and takeaways that this book provides. And the indispensable hook? As for many others, it is the remembrance of the tea and the madeleine, triggered by the tingling of the bell, a metaphor for any event that might suddenly bring back an essential childhood memory. Furthermore, it is the walks taken after supper, in the long evenings of a northern French summer, which denote a simpler era, of more basic past times (in both senses). We would periodically rent a gite near Illiers-Combray (Illiers, the real town, assumed the hyphenated name, appending the fictional Combray from Proust's novel), and drive the 12 km to the town. It is still possible to take the tour, see the bedroom where he was a boy, and called to his mother for a goodnight kiss, and hear the bell's tingle. But mainly, I enjoyed the after-dinner walk, the Swann's way one, pass the public laundry tubs, to the Pre-Catalan garden, with its pond. Each time we undertook this walk, we were the only ones in the garden, one that infused the spirit with feelings of serenity. It was as if we too were able to recover a lost time.
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
If you read Proust. follow up with Painter,
By
This review is from: Marcel Proust: A Biography (Hardcover)
Over a period of two and a half years, I read the Moncrieff / Kilmartin / Enright edition of "In Search of TIme Lost", which is an other meaning of the original title - a title which while correct, remains only correct. Proust writes long sentences, weaving much into the delicate and bold filigree. His text is beautiful. Painter provides a warming background that brings many points into finer relief. A simple example is Proust's handling of the Dreyfus affair, and how it is handled by the two Parisian salons. Painter elucidates the subject with an historically framed exposition of what the two 'Ways' mean -- the thematic of the split in French society, still present today, between the state / church, aristocracy / bourgeoisie, socialist / elite, monied / poor, and how anti-Semitism worked in these social circles.While such information is available by detailed readings of Wikipedia, Painter brings more than enough, and just the right amount of background and information for me, for a deeper understanding of the whole book. Yes, it is best to have read some, if not all of the book. The two and a half years for me was time certainly not wasted, or lost.
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