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Marcel Proust

Lydia Davis

Swann's Way Hardcover – September 15, 2003

by Marcel Proust (Author), Lydia Davis (Translator)

4.4 41 ratings

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A new translation of the first volume of Proust's In Search of Lost Time follows a sensitive boy's impressions of his family and neighbors; and includes the novella, Swann's Love. 17,500 first printing.

Reading age

1 year and up
Print length

496 pages
Language

English
Dimensions

6 x 1.25 x 9.25 inches
Publisher

Viking Adult
Publication date

September 15, 2003
ISBN-10

067003245X
ISBN-13

978-0670032457
See all details

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Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Relax: it's fantastic. There's no question that Davis's American English is thinner and more literal than C.K. Scott Montcrieff's archaically inflected turns of phrase and idioms, at least as revised by Terence Kilmartin and later by D.J. Enright. The removal of some of the familiar layers of the past in this all-new translation gives one a feeling similar to that of encountering an old master painting that has just been cleaned: the colors seem sharper and momentarily disorienting. Yet many readers will find it exhilarating, allowing the text to shed slight airs that were not quite Proust's and making many of the jokes much more immediate (as when he implies that sense-organ atrophy in the bourgeois is a defense mechanism and the result of hardening unarticulated feelings). As accomplished translator and novelist Davis (The End of the Story) notes in her foreword, she has followed Proust's sentence structure as closely as possible "in its every aspect," including punctuation, word order and word choice. To take just one case, where Montcrieff/Kilmartin describe Mlle. Vinteuil finding it pleasant to metaphorically "sojourn" in sadism, Davis has the much more definitive "emigrate." Proust's psychological inquiry generally feels much sharper, giving a much more palpable sense of Freud and Bergson-and of the young Marcel's willful (if not malefic) manipulations of those around him. For first-timers who don't have French and are allergic to the slightest whiff of euphemism, this is the best means for traveling the way by Swann's.
Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc.

About the Author

Lydia Davis was awarded the 2003 French-American Foundation Translation Prize for her translation of Marcel Proust��s Swann's Way and was named a Chevalier of the Order of Arts and Letters by the French Government for her fiction and her translations of such modern writers as Maurice Blanchot and Michel Leiris. She is the author of one novel, The End of the Story, and several volumes of stories, including Varieties of Disturbance, a National Book Award Finalist, and Can��t and Won��t, a New York Times bestseller. In 2009 her stories were brought together in one volume, The Collected Stories of Lydia Davis, which was called ��a grand cumulative achievement�� and ��one of the great, strange American literary contributions�� by James Wood in The New Yorker and ��one of the great books in recent literature�� by Dan Chiasson in The New York Review of Books. A MacArthur Fellow, Davis lives near Albany, New York.

Product details

Publisher ‏ : ‎ Viking Adult (September 15, 2003)
Language ‏ : ‎ English
Hardcover ‏ : ‎ 496 pages
ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 067003245X
ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0670032457
Reading age ‏ : ‎ 1 year and up
Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 1.78 pounds
Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 6 x 1.25 x 9.25 inches

Best Sellers Rank: #515,076 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #1,306 in Classic American Literature
- #13,052 in Classic Literature & Fiction
- #26,048 in Literary Fiction (Books)

Customer Reviews:
4.4 41 ratings

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Marcel Proust
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Customer reviews

4.4 out of 5

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Lynn Maland

Great purchase through Amazon

Reviewed in the United States on July 28, 2023

Verified Purchase

Purchased used from Friends of the San Francisco Public Library. Excellent condition as advertised.

Helpful

Amazon Customer

This is a relatively new translation

Reviewed in the United States on April 1, 2022

Verified Purchase

I am somewhat knowledgeable in French, so I have compared her translation to the original and find that her work accurately matches the original. As a book, Swann's Way is the first book in Remembrances of Things Past. Marcel Proust, in my opinion, is neurotic introvert. His descriptions of the people around him are fascinating but it seems always related to his musings about himself.

Reviewed in the United States on April 2, 2006

Verified Purchase

I admit that Proust is not for everyone. I admit that some of Proust's sentences, paragraphs, and even pages are inscrutable (and not genius, but self-indulgent rambling). I admit that Proust was not familiar with the term "plot."

But one cannot shake the feeling that In Search of Lost Time (beginning with this great translation of Swann's Way) is the ultimate written work about what it means to live. Existence iself, in all its forms (time, love, beauty, self, and the other) is the subject Proust holds forth on.

If you love great books, and have spent years isolating what it is at the very essence that makes you love and remember a novel, Swann's Way is for you. It will reward you if you fight through the times you feel like putting it down.

28 people found this helpful

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M. Kolb

Awesome quick response

Reviewed in the United States on September 27, 2009

Verified Purchase

In ordering a copy of Proust's Swann's Way, the formal order form stated that it would be start to be filled (not mailed) anywhere up to 21 days. Instead of a long wait, the book arrived in perfect condition- like brand new-- within 4 days from placing the order. Thank you! I'll happily use this seller again.

One person found this helpful

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Johanna Johnson

Three Stars

Reviewed in the United States on January 3, 2017

Verified Purchase

A writer's bok, rather than for a general reader Important historically

One person found this helpful

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Nancy S. Kassabaum

Three Stars

Reviewed in the United States on January 24, 2016

Verified Purchase

AS EXPECTED, DIFFICULT READ!

One person found this helpful

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Michael Gunther

Duelling Translations

Reviewed in the United States on November 15, 2003

Those of us who love Proust - either from long acquaintance, or from reading him for the very first time - can count ourselves fortunate in now having two very fine English translations to work from: the classic Moncrieff/Kilmartin rendition of the complete novel, and the new Lydia Davis translation of "Swann's Way." I've read and enjoyed both, because each brings something special and valuable to the work.
Davis is a breath of fresh air, being more literal (while still literary!) in that she follows the original French syntax and meaning more closely. I liked her translation, and applaud it. Normally, such a fine translation would be my first choice. However - and I admit this is a very subjective judgement - I was long ago seduced by the sheer beauty of Moncrieff/Kilmartin, and therefore cannot love the Davis translation quite so much. Of all authors, Proust requires us to surrender to the beauty of his language. Davis' translation is, for me, more likeable than loveable.
Really, it's an old (and impossible to resolve!) conflict between the more literal and the more "poetic" type of translation. I've dealt with this myself, in trying to translate Baudelaire, and there's no perfect answer. One thing I'd suggest (if you haven't read MK) is to get the MK translation of Swann's Way, now available in a very inexpensive paperback, along with Davis so that you can get a feel for both ways of appreciating Proust's great and magnificent work.

171 people found this helpful

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Chocolate Moose

Beautiful but fatiguing

Reviewed in the United States on January 24, 2007

Clearly, Proust has a remarkable gift for perception, as if he is able to see human experience, circumstance, and even plain objects, in exploded detail, and distill them for the reader. Particularly in the first and third parts of the book, he frequently drops gems of absolute truth, in much the same way that Shakespearean couplets remarkably capture the essence of love or revenge. To me, this is the reward of reading the book, and what makes the challenge worth undertaking.

At first, you may be overwhelmed by his very complex sentences, as others have noted. It is important to Proust to express an entire thought in one sentence; a lofty objective with sometimes dire consequences, but Proust adheres to it admirably. You soon learn to maintain the subject of the sentence in your head while Proust explores two or three tangents to the original thought before he comes back to it. What works in the reader's favor is that Proust is very regular with his sentence structure, so once you develop a feel for it, it ceases to intimidate.

The book is divided into three parts: The first and third parts recount experiences of Proust's early childhood, while the second part details the love affair of Charles Swann. To me, the first part is the most beautiful, followed by the third part. You will be able to tell within the first 50 or so pages whether or not Proust will suit you. The second part of the book becomes plodding and monotonous, as Proust narrates even a simple set of circumstances in many layers of redundancy, each recounted in exhaustive detail, in his complex style which begins to feel formulaic, wordy, and indulgent. Here's the subject of the sentence, tangent number one, the tangent to tangent number one, tangent number two, and then it ends with yet another metaphor about invalids. The regularity of sentence structure is much easier to tolerate in the first and third parts because Proust flits between several ideas or subjects, whereas in the second part, he drills to the very core of the earth on one or two subjects with a few variations. I found myself feeling pretty burned out, counting down pages to the end of Part 2. My advice is to pick up your reading speed if it starts to become boring or if you lose your concentration.

If Proust were not quite so overly thorough in Part 2, or if he had varied his cadence or sentence structure a bit more, I could recommend this book without hesitation. As it is, it will require an unusual investment of concentration and patience, but I believe it is worth it.

12 people found this helpful

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