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Proust and His World
Book by Sansom, William
128 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 1973
39 people want to read
About the author
William Sansom
103 books25 followersSansom was born in London and educated at Uppingham School, Rutland, before moving to Bonn to learn German.
From 1930 onwards, Sansom worked in international banking for the British chapter of a German bank, but moved to an advertising company in 1935, where he worked until the outbreak of World War II. At this time he became a full-time London firefighter, serving throughout The Blitz. His experiences during this time inspired much of his writing, including many of the stories found in the celebrated collection Fireman Flower. He also appeared in Humphrey Jennings's famous film about the Blitz, Fires Were Started- Sansom is the fireman who plays the piano.
After the war, Sansom became a full-time writer. In 1946 and 1947 he was awarded two literary prizes by the Society of Authors, and in 1951 was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature. He married actress Ruth Grundy.
As well as exploring war-torn London, Sansom's writing deals with romance (The Face of Innocence), murder ('Various Temptations'), comedy ('A Last Word') and supernatural horror ('A Woman Seldom Found'). The latter, perhaps his most anthologized story, combines detailed description with narrative tension to unravel a young man's encounter with a bizarre creature in Rome.
Sansom died in London.
From the Independent, October 2008:
"..William Sansom was once described as London's closest equivalent to Franz Kafka. He wrote in hallucinatory detail, bringing every image into pin-sharp focus. It was his strength and weakness; it made his stories hauntingly memorable, but his technique often left his characters feeling under-developed.
His style was as cool and painstaking as that of Henry Green, also a wartime firefighter. His 1944 collection Fireman Flower, and Other Short Stories may be his pinnacle. In "The Little Room", a nun waits for death after being bricked up in her windowless cell for an unnamed transgression. To make her fate worse, a meter on the wall marks the incremental loss of the air in the room, and Sansom describes her changing state of mind with passion and clinical precision.
The 1948 novella "The Equilibriad" owes a little too much to Kafka but shares the same strangeness, as the hero awakes to find himself able to walk only at a 45-degree angle. Sansom was also good with an opening hook. One story starts, "How did the three boys ever come to spend their lives in the water-main junction?"
Sansom's publisher described his work as "modern fables", but what makes them so ripe for rediscovery is their freshness and currency. His characters face inscrutable futures with patience and resignation, knowing that they can do little to influence the outcome of their lives. Sometimes terrible events, such as the collapse of a burning wall, slow down and expand to engulf the reader..."
http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-ent...
Christine Brooke-Rose shares short story space with Sansom in Winter Tales no 8, and homages him in The Languages of Love.
From 1930 onwards, Sansom worked in international banking for the British chapter of a German bank, but moved to an advertising company in 1935, where he worked until the outbreak of World War II. At this time he became a full-time London firefighter, serving throughout The Blitz. His experiences during this time inspired much of his writing, including many of the stories found in the celebrated collection Fireman Flower. He also appeared in Humphrey Jennings's famous film about the Blitz, Fires Were Started- Sansom is the fireman who plays the piano.
After the war, Sansom became a full-time writer. In 1946 and 1947 he was awarded two literary prizes by the Society of Authors, and in 1951 was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature. He married actress Ruth Grundy.
As well as exploring war-torn London, Sansom's writing deals with romance (The Face of Innocence), murder ('Various Temptations'), comedy ('A Last Word') and supernatural horror ('A Woman Seldom Found'). The latter, perhaps his most anthologized story, combines detailed description with narrative tension to unravel a young man's encounter with a bizarre creature in Rome.
Sansom died in London.
From the Independent, October 2008:
"..William Sansom was once described as London's closest equivalent to Franz Kafka. He wrote in hallucinatory detail, bringing every image into pin-sharp focus. It was his strength and weakness; it made his stories hauntingly memorable, but his technique often left his characters feeling under-developed.
His style was as cool and painstaking as that of Henry Green, also a wartime firefighter. His 1944 collection Fireman Flower, and Other Short Stories may be his pinnacle. In "The Little Room", a nun waits for death after being bricked up in her windowless cell for an unnamed transgression. To make her fate worse, a meter on the wall marks the incremental loss of the air in the room, and Sansom describes her changing state of mind with passion and clinical precision.
The 1948 novella "The Equilibriad" owes a little too much to Kafka but shares the same strangeness, as the hero awakes to find himself able to walk only at a 45-degree angle. Sansom was also good with an opening hook. One story starts, "How did the three boys ever come to spend their lives in the water-main junction?"
Sansom's publisher described his work as "modern fables", but what makes them so ripe for rediscovery is their freshness and currency. His characters face inscrutable futures with patience and resignation, knowing that they can do little to influence the outcome of their lives. Sometimes terrible events, such as the collapse of a burning wall, slow down and expand to engulf the reader..."
http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-ent...
Christine Brooke-Rose shares short story space with Sansom in Winter Tales no 8, and homages him in The Languages of Love.
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Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews
May 11, 2021
This is a preliminary reading to another preliminary reading to a final reading.
The final objective is Proust’s entire À la recherche du temps perdu (Visit Group http://www.goodreads.com/group/list/3...). The immediate preliminary reading is Marcel Proust: A Life with close to 800 pages. And this preliminary to the preliminary is, with only 124 pages and with half the space taken up by photographs, a perfect apéritif.
I bought the book for the pictures, and these did not disappoint me but saddened me. The pictures are a wonderful selection of places and people. Some are photos, some are paintings, but it is such a shame that they all are in black and white. How could Thames and Hudson do this?
The surprise was the text.
Sansom has managed in few words to give a very good introduction to Proust’s life, to his times, to his fellow writers, socialites and lovers. Early in the book he conjures up Proust, convincingly, as the figure of an “excluded man” and proceeds to narrate his life touching on various aspects and episodes, such as his family, his finances, his health, his involvement in the Dreyfus affair, the relationship with his publishers etc…, as they crop up along the years.
The last pages introduce some of the themes developed in his work, like the role of memory and how this can be best preserved in Art. Sansom is particularly acute at picturing the frame of mind that La recherche requires, and inviting us to start savoring the durée that will last, at least, the whole work.
This was then an excellent introduction. So, I am now ready for the next Preliminary of about twelve times the amount of words. And then I will be fit for the sixty times more words of the final
I think this book is out of print. I found it second hand.
The final objective is Proust’s entire À la recherche du temps perdu (Visit Group http://www.goodreads.com/group/list/3...). The immediate preliminary reading is Marcel Proust: A Life with close to 800 pages. And this preliminary to the preliminary is, with only 124 pages and with half the space taken up by photographs, a perfect apéritif.
I bought the book for the pictures, and these did not disappoint me but saddened me. The pictures are a wonderful selection of places and people. Some are photos, some are paintings, but it is such a shame that they all are in black and white. How could Thames and Hudson do this?
The surprise was the text.
Sansom has managed in few words to give a very good introduction to Proust’s life, to his times, to his fellow writers, socialites and lovers. Early in the book he conjures up Proust, convincingly, as the figure of an “excluded man” and proceeds to narrate his life touching on various aspects and episodes, such as his family, his finances, his health, his involvement in the Dreyfus affair, the relationship with his publishers etc…, as they crop up along the years.
The last pages introduce some of the themes developed in his work, like the role of memory and how this can be best preserved in Art. Sansom is particularly acute at picturing the frame of mind that La recherche requires, and inviting us to start savoring the durée that will last, at least, the whole work.
This was then an excellent introduction. So, I am now ready for the next Preliminary of about twelve times the amount of words. And then I will be fit for the sixty times more words of the final
I think this book is out of print. I found it second hand.
November 5, 2023
This book seemed to come very close to achieving Proust's goal of capturing lost time. Even though I wasn't alive then, the very fine analysis by Sansom - beautifully and succinctly written - along with the profusion of poignant photos and paintings of the places and people of Proust's world, brought it all home to me and actually made me nostalgic. Although, at the same time, relieved that we are no longer living in the too-rarified and constricted atmosphere of that society. Sansom has put it all together, nicely ... identifying the real characters of that place and time who infused their personalities into Proust's just-as-famous fictional characters (or perhaps, even more famous, fictional characters). The many illustrations and photos - all in black & white - reminded me of W.G. Sebald's insets, which lend a certain emotional tone to the material. The real people Sansom has depicted are, of course, all gone ... and the world has moved on, as it always does ... so there is a dichotomous feel of time being both regained and irretrievably lost.
August 3, 2018
Having read several biographies of Proust, including those by William Carter and Jean Yves Tadié, William Sansom’s minor contribution in the Thames and Hudson Literary Lives series presented a quick read. Overall, it quickly breezes over Proust’s early life and focuses for the larger part on the years he worked on his great masterpiece. A good but gossipy introduction (mostly gleaned from George Painter’s study, I suspect) that may tempt a hesitant reader to plunge further in Proust’s great novel. Samson provides a brief overview of the novel, highlighting many of its most memorable and important episodes. Wonderfully illustrated, there are many illustrations of Proust’s family and friends not seen in other publications.
June 22, 2019
An enjoyable insight into Proust’s life and anecdotes, and how they found their way into his magnum opus; In Search of Lost Time.
August 20, 2011
I've thoroughly skimmed through this. I wanted to get a better idea of the sights, sounds, and social milieu of early 20th century Paris for my reading of In Search of Lost Time (currently on vol. 2!)and this book does an admirable job of doing that, even on though I've only read about a third of it and spend/spent most of my time looking at the pictures and taking in a sample of 1920's Parisian fashion and architecture, as well as the people who influenced Proust's characters. Definitely worth your time if you want to enjoy the delicately brutal and fascinating world of In Search of Lost Time.
Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews