Kadonnutta aikaa etsimässä 8 – Vanki

À la recherche du temps perdu #5

by Marcel Proust, Inkeri Tuomikoski (Translator), Erja Manto (Narrator)

Vanki, Kadonnutta aikaa etsimässä -kirjasarjan suomennoksen kahdeksas osa.
Radioteatteri lukee Marcel Proustin Kadonnutta aikaa etsimässä, kymmenestä niteestä koostuvan upean romaanisarjan, jonka Proust kirjoitti vuosina 1908–1922.
Kadonnutta aikaa etsimässä julkaistiin ensimmäisen kerran Ranskassa vuosina 1913–1927. Se on kehityskertomus, kertoo elämästä äärimmäisen yksityiskohtaisesti ja analyyttisesti mutta myös assosiatiivisesti ja hauskasti. Proustin kieli on ilmaisevaa, hurjaa ja kaunista koruommelta mutta samalla tarkkaa ja älykästä.

Genres: Classics, Fiction, France, French Literature, Literature, Novels, 20th Century

Audiobook

First published January 1, 1923

About the author

Marcel Proust was a French novelist, best known for his 3000 page masterpiece À la recherche du temps perdu (Remembrance of Things Past or In Search of Lost Time), a pseudo-autobiographical novel told mostly in a stream-of-consciousness style.

Born in the first year of the Third Republic, the young Marcel, like his narrator, was a delicate child from a bourgeois family. He was active in Parisian high society during the 80s and 90s, welcomed in the most fashionable and exclusive salons of his day. However, his position there was also one of an outsider, due to his Jewishness and homosexuality. Towards the end of 1890s Proust began to withdraw more and more from society, and although he was never entirely reclusive, as is sometimes made out, he lapsed more completely into his lifelong tendency to sleep during the day and work at night. He was also plagued with severe asthma, which had troubled him intermittently since childhood, and a terror of his own death, especially in case it should come before his novel had been completed. The first volume, after some difficulty finding a publisher, came out in 1913, and Proust continued to work with an almost inhuman dedication on his masterpiece right up until his death in 1922, at the age of 51.

Today he is widely recognized as one of the greatest authors of the 20th Century, and À la recherche du temps perdu as one of the most dazzling and significant works of literature to be written in modern times.

Reviews

[Vit Babenco · Rating 5 out of 5]

The personages of the book don’t live… They just play their roles… Their emptiness and inanity they hide behind grandiloquence…

I could feel that my life was no longer what it once might have been; and that to have, in this way, a woman with whom, quite naturally, when she came home, I would be expected to go out, to whose embellishment the strength and activity of my being would be increasingly devoted, made me into something like a twig which has grown in length, but is weighed down by the plump fruit in which all its reserves of strength have been concentrated.

Now the hero’s sweetheart resides in his apartment almost as a captive… But his love slowly turns quite ambiguous – frequently he is tormented by jealousy, sometimes he feels indifferent and at times he is full of loathing… And they are literally drowning in the stream of mutual lies…

Furthermore, we can feel that in these lies there is always a measure of truth, that if life does not bring changes to our love, soon we ourselves will want to do so, or to pretend that they have occurred, and to talk of separation, so evident is it that all loves and all things move rapidly towards farewells. We want to weep the tears that the ending will bring, long before it happens. No doubt this time, in the scene I had just been playing, there was a practical consideration.

But actually the hero is even a greater prisoner than his sweetheart… He is a prisoner of his egotism, his suspiciousness and, most of all, of his inertia.

[Guille · Rating 5 out of 5]

Viene de…

“Sólo se ama aquello en lo que se persigue algo inaccesible, sólo se ama lo que no se posee.”

Qué atractiva es en la distancia de la literatura la figura de Marcel, más fascinante cuanto más odioso se empeña en retratarse y más cuanto más seguros estamos de que el retrato es fidedigno. Compadezcámonos de él porque es una forma de compadecernos de nosotros mismos.

En esta tragicomedia que es “La prisionera” el amor solo puedo significar dolor. Únicamente se puede amar aquello que no se alcanza, aquello que se escapa sin remedio y es ese algo lo que, paradójicamente, angustia a Marcel, lo que le hace dudar, lo que le deja patente que por mucho que llegue a poseer el cuerpo de su amada nunca podrá ser el señor de sus pensamientos. Podrá mantenerla prisionera, pero nunca podrá saber con seguridad absoluta si Albertine desea su cautiverio, si cuando su mirada queda presa de un objeto cualquiera no es porque esté añorando otras compañías, otros placeres quizás prohibidos y por los que podría ser abandonado.

“Habría que escoger entre dejar de sufrir o dejar de amar. Pues así como al principio está formado por el deseo, más tarde el amor sólo es mantenido por la ansiedad dolorosa. Sentía que una parte de la vida de Albertine se me escapaba. El amor, en la ansiedad dolorosa lo mismo que en el deseo feliz, es la exigencia de un todo. No nace, no subsiste si no queda una parte por conquistar. Sólo se ama lo que no se posee por entero.”

Marcel pasa sus días postrado en la cama, disfrutando de los goces de la soledad, de la intensidad con la que es capaz de evocar sus recuerdos, multiplicando por mil sus efectos al fusionarlos con la contemplación de una lámina o la audición de una música querida. También eran para él un precioso objeto de contemplación las muchachas que pasaban ante la ventana de su habitación, una lavandera con su cesto de ropa, una panadera con su mandil azul, una lechera con peto y mangas de tela blanca, una altiva muchacha rubia siguiendo a su institutriz. Pero, sobre todo, su postración le permitía disimular una debilidad mayor a la real por evitar los paseos parisinos con Albertine y morir de celos a cada movimiento de sus ojos. Un tormento que se agranda hasta el infinito debido a que él mismo proyecta en ella su “propio deseo perpetuo de agradar a nuevas mujeres, de esbozar nuevas aventuras”. Se obsesiona por repensar el pasado en busca de pistas que le confirmen sus miedos, por rumiar todas las conversaciones que con ella mantiene rastreando contradicciones, deslices, confesiones no intencionadas, una y otra vez, una y otra vez, una y otra vez, como el que no puede evitar pasar la lengua por la muela cariada, hasta desesperarse él y exasperar a sus lectores con una cantinela repetida mil veces. Y así, quizás, era él el más cautivo, el más esclavo, aunque su martirio estuviera perversamente atenuado por la seguridad de que Albertine padecía cruelmente su situación y porque bajo su sumisión privaba de sus placeres a todos los demás hombres.

“Los celos son también un demonio que no puede exorcizarse, y siempre reaparece encarnado bajo una forma nueva. Y aunque consigamos exterminarlos todos y conservar perpetuamente a nuestro lado a la que amamos, el Espíritu del Mal asumiría entonces otra forma, todavía más patética: la desesperación de haber obtenido la fidelidad sólo por la fuerza, por la desesperación de no ser amado.”

Resultan conmovedoras y patéticas sus congojas, sus sospechas, al mismo tiempo que se obstina en convencernos de que ha dejado de amar. Su deseo oscila, de este modo, entre la necesidad de mantenerla a su lado cuando la cree perdida y la de abandonarla en cuanto recupera la calma, entre su visión de la Albertine de Balbec, que le inspiraba amor porque le hacía sufrir, y esta esclava, dócil y aburrida de la que le gustaría liberarse.

“No es que no me permitiera experimentar muchas alegrías de las que el dolor intenso me había privado, pero, lejos de debérselas a Albertine, quien, por lo demás, apenas me parecía ya hermosa y con la cual me aburría, a la que tenía la clara sensación de haber dejado de amar, las saboreaba, al contrario, cuando Albertine no estaba a mi lado.”

Y uno llega a pensar si todos esos celos, todo ese amor que dice sentir y, al momento, no sentir, no se reducirá a un horror insuperable a ser abandonado, a volver a sentir esa indignación que le embargaba en el pasado cuando su madre se alejaba de su cama sin darle las buenas noches o cuando le despedía en la estación de tren.


Por lo demás, me alegré mucho de que en este tomo, ya uno de mis favoritos, Marcel no volviera a abrumarnos con sus largas incursiones en los salones parisinos, aunque en su cierta dosis tales reuniones sean encantadoramente aborrecibles y ésta a la que asiste en casa de los Verdurin no le sobre ni una coma, dando pie, además, a magníficos comentarios sobre el arte y los artistas y en dónde asistimos a algo así como a una epifanía de Marcel.

“Había podido llegar hasta mí la extraña llamada que ya nunca dejaría de oír, como la promesa de que existía algo distinto- cuya realización dependía probablemente del arte- de la nada que había encontrado en todos los placeres y en el amor mismo, y de que si mi vida me parecía tan vana, al menos no estaba enteramente acabada.”

Aun así, son más de mi gusto sus elucubraciones en soledad, sus pensamientos, sus particulares sensaciones, aunque versen simplemente sobre su fetichismo por los vestidos de mujer o los gritos de los vendedores callejeros. Me es realmente fascinante cuando saca a trabajar su bisturí emocional y nos muestra toda la sangre y pus que brota de los modos y maneras de la sociedad que le rodea y de él mismo. Roza la perversión esta satisfacción que obtenemos de sus comentarios acerca de, por ejemplo, la decepción que se siente ante la dama virtuosa que a poco se convierte en una lúbrica Furia o, por el contrario, el desengaño ante la que nos confiesa aliviada que su dureza y agresividad no es más que una barrera construida alrededor de su profunda timidez; el sufrimiento que nos confiere la carta no recibida de la mujer que abandonamos y que hemos vuelto a amar a causa precisamente de ese desplante epistolar; la rara aritmética de algunos deseos cuya satisfacción conjunta hace disminuir el placer que habríamos obtenido de cada uno de ellos por separado; lo poco que queda a veces del amor cuando este se disocia de las circunstancias que lo rodean; la extraña inclinación a sustituir con inocentes mentiras verdades igualmente inocentes; la vileza de hacer oídos sordos a la muerte de un familiar o conocido por no arruinar la velada prevista; lo mucho que la pertenencia a nuestra especie explica nuestros actos (“obramos a ciegas, pero eligiendo como los animales la planta que nos resulta favorable… todo ocurre como si entráramos en ella (la vida) con un fardo de obligaciones contraídas en una vida anterior”); en fin, la gran alegría que procura la posesión en cuerpo y alma de una mujer, mayor aún que la del propio amor.

“Su sueño realizaba en cierta medida la posibilidad del amor; estando solo, podía pensar en ella, pero me faltaba, no la poseía. Presente ella, le hablaba, pero me encontraba demasiado ausente de mí mismo para poder pensar. Cuando ella dormía, ya no tenía yo que hablar, sabía que ya no me miraba, ya no tenía yo necesidad de vivir en la superficie de mí mismo. Al cerrar los ojos, al perder la consciencia, Albertine se había despojado, uno tras otro, de sus diferentes caracteres de humanidad que me habían decepcionado desde el día en que la había conocido.”

Continúa….

[Leonard Gaya · Rating 5 out of 5]

« La vie donc oscille, comme un pendule, de droite à gauche, de la souffrance à l’ennui » (Schopenhauer, Le Monde comme volonté et comme représentation, IV, §57). On ne peut douter que Proust eut cette célèbre sentence à l’esprit lorsqu’il écrivit ce cinquième volume de la Recherche, en particulier : « Je sentais que ma vie avec Albertine n’était, pour une part, quand je n’étais pas jaloux, qu’ennui, pour l’autre part, quand j’étais jaloux, que souffrance » (Pléiade, vol. 3, p. 895). Dans La Prisonnière, l’ensemble des éléments ajoutés, mélangés et dissous dans les volumes précédents semblent se précipiter, se cristalliser selon les deux pentes de cette dichotomie.

Le thème de la jalousie amoureuse, ébauché dans l’ouverture du premier volume avec le baiser du soir, puis développé dans ses variations diverses (Odette, Gilberte, Albertine, Rachel, Morel, etc.), trouve ici son expression la plus aboutie dans la figure d’Albertine en captivité. Face à elle, Marcel, son ravisseur, apparaît pris d’une véritable manie psychopathe et, à vrai dire, le rapprochement, voire l’identité entre le sentiment amoureux et la maladie est un motif récurrent, où le pendule de Schopenhauer fonctionne à plein régime.

Marcel retient désormais Albertine prisonnière auprès de lui, aussi n’a-t-il plus de raisons objectives d’être jaloux. Mais cela ne lui apporte aucune satisfaction : l’idée qu’elle soit toute dévouée à son désir dominateur ne lui procure qu’ennui et, presque, que dégoût. Il aimait l’autre Albertine — le Narrateur ne cesse d’y revenir : Albertine est multiple —, l’Albertine fuyante, filante, fugitive, évanescente, vivante et libre, l’Albertine insaisissable sur son vélo le long des plages de Balbec. Maintenant mise en cage, dans un appartement parisien, comme l’océan dans une bouteille, tout son charme s’est évanoui, et à la brise marine s’est substitué une odeur de renfermé. Comment, dès lors, ne pas trouver Albertine laide et ennuyeuse ? Comment ne pas, en un curieux retournement du jeu de pouvoir amoureux, trouver sa présence oppressante ?

Du coup, Marcel est sans cesse tenaillé par l’idée de rompre avec Albertine, mais craint en même temps d’être abandonné. Ainsi devient-il maladivement possessif, ainsi doute-t-il de tous ses faits et gestes de manière paranoïaque, ainsi ne peut-il croire que ce qui va dans le sens de sa jalousie, ainsi se met-il à jouer avec elle à toutes sortes de jeux pervers pour la coincer et se convaincre qu’il avait bien raison de la croire trompeuse, menteuse, vicieuse et infidèle, ainsi feint-il de vouloir la quitter mais pour mieux pouvoir la retenir et la contrôler, ainsi, ainsi... Bref, le protagoniste part définitivement en vrille dans une spirale qui ne peut aboutir qu’à la rupture et à la souffrance.

Plus encore, cette dichotomie du sentiment se double d’une duplicité de l’énonciation, soulignée par le Narrateur : « Mes paroles ne reflétaient donc nullement mes sentiments. Si le lecteur n’en a que l’impression assez faible, c’est qu’étant narrateur je lui expose mes sentiments en même temps que je lui répète mes paroles. Mais si je lui cachais les premiers et s’il connaissait seulement les secondes, mes actes, si peu en rapport avec elles, lui donneraient si souvent l’impression d’étranges revirements qu’il me croirait à peu près fou. » (p. 850) Le plus étonnant dans tout cela reste le phlegme d’Albertine, dont le monologue intérieur nous reste inaccessible. On ne peut s’empêcher de penser qu’elle ne reste auprès de Marcel que pour des raisons de dépendance matérielle…

Seuls répits dans cette bataille des sentiments, ces « feux tournants de la jalousie » (p. 611) : d’abord les interludes esthétiques — la mort de Bergotte devant la Vue de Delft de Vermeer, au début du roman ; au milieu, les exquises méditations sur Wagner et sur le Septuor de Vinteuil ; les discussions sur Dostoïevski et Thomas Hardy vers la fin. Ensuite et surtout, il y a ces moments où Marcel contemple Albertine endormie. Ces passages (il y en a plusieurs) ont quelque chose de très doux, de très contemplatif, qui s’écarte des jeux sadomasochistes de la vie diurne. Et pourtant, même là, on est pris par cette impression troublante d’être les témoins d’un acte fétichiste : comme si la subjectivité même d’Albertine était un obstacle à la jouissance sexuelle du protagoniste. Quelque chose, en somme, qui tendrait de manière asymptotique vers la nécrophilie — et à diverses occasions, Proust nous annonce la mort prochaine d’Albertine.

Procédé coutumier, Proust insère une longue soirée musicale, au milieu du roman, qui fonctionne, en un jeu de miroirs, comme une version miniature, comme une variation sur le thème principal, transposée sur une tonalité différente : l’épisode chez les Verdurin, qui, à travers le jeu des interactions mondaines, aboutira, là aussi, à une double rupture — celle de Charlus avec les Verdurin et, plus douloureuse encore, celle de Charlus avec Morel.

Bref, autant le dire, La Prisonnière est un roman où la dimension conflictuelle (interne et externe, intime et mondaine), l’élément dramatique, est beaucoup plus marqué que dans les volumes précédents. C’est aussi le roman où s’exprime à son comble la jalousie, comme implacable puissance d’artifice — analogue en amour à ce que la création de fictions est à la littérature. Sans doute est-ce là aussi une des raisons essentielles qui font de sa lecture l’une des plus entraînantes et l’une des moins ennuyeuses de l’œuvre de Proust.

> Vol. précédent : Sodome et Gomorrhe
> Vol. suivant : Albertine disparue

[فؤاد · Rating 5 out of 5]

سرگردان در هزارتوی رمزها و نشانه‌ها
خطا می‌کنم و باز می‌گردم
به دنبال راه آسمان

امیلی دیکنسون


ریویوی زیر بخشی از یادداشت های من از جلسۀ دوم درسگفتار «پروست و نشانه ها» عادل مشایخی است.

در جستجوی حقیقت

در جستجوی زمان از دست رفته تصویری از اندیشه و شیوه ای از جستجوی حقیقت را عرضه می کند که تصویری است متفاوت از تصویر سنتی اندیشه. ابزار اصلی این جستجو، «نشانه» است. منظور از نشانه در اینجا چیزی است که نظم متعارف دنیای ما را به هم می زند و به ما وعدۀ جهانی غیر از جهان خودمان می دهد. ما در حالت عادی تلاش می کنیم از این نشانه ها اجتناب کنیم، تا دنیای آشنای خود را حفظ کنیم. اما نشانه به تعبیر دولوز، خشونت می ورزد، به شیوۀ اندیشیدن متعارف و مألوف ما تعرض می کند، آرامش در جهان آشنا بودن را از ما سلب می کند و به ما نیرو وارد می کند تا به دنبال جهان ناشناخته ای که نشانه وعده می دهد برویم. این جهان متفاوت و ناشناخته، همان حقیقتی است که پروست در رمان به دنبالش می گردد.

وظیفۀ فرد این است که خودش را مدام در معرض نشانه ها قرار دهد و کشف کند جهانی که این نشانه ها بدان اشاره می کنند کجاست، آیا حقیقت دارد یا توهم است، و تا به این کشف نرسد، نمی تواند حقیقتی که می جوید را بیابد.

نشانه های چهارگانه
در رمان چهار نوع نشانه مطرح می شوند که به راوی را به دنبال خود می کشانند و جهان هایی متفاوت از جهان روزمره را به او وعده می دهند.

اول: نشانه های محفلی
بزرگ ترین مثال این نشانه ها در رمان، محافل اشرافی (مثل محفل وردورن ها) است، که قواعد خاص خودشان و سلسله طبقات خاص خودشان را دارند. در هر محفل، و به طور کلی در هر گروه اجتماعی، افراد ناخودآگاه نشانه هایی خاص صادر می کنند که شاید خود متوجه نباشند، اما توجه کسی که با آن گروه اجتماعی غریبه است را به خود جلب می کند. افراد به شکل خاصی حرف می زنند، تکیه کلام های خاصی دارند، به وقایع خاصی اشاره هایی سربسته می کنند که خودشان خبر دارند، و... تا جایی که در این گروه ها کسی دیگر فکر جدیدی نمی کند یا حرف جدیدی نمی زند یا کار جدیدی نمی کند، بلکه فقط نشانه صادر می کند و به چیزهایی که اعضای گروه می دانند اشاره می کند.

تمام این نشانه ها، باعث می شود فرد تازه وارد حس کند اعضای این گروه به جهانی بزرگ از خاطراتی جذاب و منحصر به فرد دسترسی دارند که از بیگانه ها پوشیده است. اما وقتی به محفل وارد شد و با نشانه ها آشنا شد، متوجه می شود که این نشانه ها توخالی و تهی هستند و خاطرات منحصر به فرد گروه چقدر پیش پا افتاده و بی ارزشند. به عبارت دیگر نشانه های محفلی، به حقیقتی ارجاع نمی دهند، بلکه جای آن را می گیرند.

این اتفاق در بافت های وسیع تر اجتماعی هم رخ می دهد. روابط عاشقانه، متشکل از علاماتی است، همچون نحو خاص حرف زدن یا عکس گرفتن یا نوازش های خاص که جای عشق واقعی را گرفته، یا در عرصۀ سیاست، ادای «صلح دوستی» یا «عدالت محوری» و غیره که جای صلح دوستی و عدالت محوری واقعی را گرفته اند، و...

دوم: نشانه های عشق
در جلد دوم، در سایۀ دوشیزگان شکوفا، از میان جمع بی شکل دخترانی که راوی می بیند، تنها یکی برجستگی پیدا می کند (آلبرتین)، چطور؟ از طریق نشانه ها. راوی بارها اشاره می کند که حالات و اطوار آلبرتین به گونه ای بود که انگار جهانی دارد که راوی از آن ها بی خبر است، با کسان دیگری می گردد، جاهای مختلف را گشته است، خوشی های پنهانی دارد که از راوی پوشیده است. و به محض آن که راوی در جلد پنجم، اسیر، آلبرتین را در خانۀ خودش محصور می کند تا جایی نرود و با کسی نگردد، آن جلوۀ وسوسه انگیز آلبرتین هم از بین می رود، و راوی حس می کند دیگر علاقه ای به آلبرتین ندارد و تصمیم می گیرد رابطه شان را به هم بزند. در حقیقت، راوی، نه خود آلبرتین را، بلکه جهان پنهانی آلبرتین را عاشق است و هر گاه متوجه می شود که آلبرتین مخفیانه جایی رفته و با کسانی گشته، دوباره این عشق سر بر می آورد و شدت می یابد.

عشق به دیگری، در حقیقت عشق به جهانی دیگر است، جهانی جدای از جهان آشنای ما. نشانه هایی که معشوق صادر می کند تکه هایی از جهانی دیگرند که من به آن راه ندارم، و وسوسه انگیز بودن آن ها به همین جهت است. این نشانه ها لذت بخشند، از آن جهت که متعلق به جهانی دیگرند، و نیز دردناکند، از آن جهت که من به آن جهان راه ندارم.

فقط آنی را دوست می داریم که در آن چیزی دست نیافتنی می جوییم، فقط آنی را دوست می داریم که نداریم.
جلد ۵: اسیر

اهمیت نشانه های محفلی و نشانه های عشق، آن است که فرد را آماده می کنند برای یادگرفتن تأویل نشانه ها و کشف جهانی ورای جهان روزمره. فرد با قرار گرفتن در معرض این نشانه ها، حساس بار می آید و مدام به دنبال نشانه هایی است که خبر از حقیقتی پنهان می دهد و به واقعیت روزمره بسنده نمی کند. وگرنه پروست معتقد است که نشانه های عشق هم، همچون نشانه های محفلی، فاقد حقیقت هستند.

سوم: نشانه های محسوس
این نوع نشانه ها در «در جستجوی زمان از دست رفته» فراوانند. یک کیفیت محسوس، یک احساس، نه به چیزی که از آن صادر شده، بلکه به جهانی به کلی متفاوت ارجاع می دهد. نمونۀ برجستۀ آن، شیرینی مادلن است که چشیدن طعم آن راوی را به دوران کودکی اش پرتاب می کند. طعم شیرینی مادلن در اینجا نه به خود شیرینی، بلکه به دوران کودکی راوی در کومبره ارجاع می دهد که یک شیء نیست، بلکه یک جهان متفاوت با جهان و زندگی حاضر راوی است.

این نشانه ها در رمان دو ویژگی دارند:

اول، این که تجربۀ آن ها شادی ای در بر دارد.

دوم، این که نوعی الزام و اجبار در این نشانه ها وجود دارد. گفتیم که نیرو و خشونت وجه مشخصۀ اصلی تمام نشانه هاست. این نیرو در این نشانه های محسوس به صراحت قابل مشاهده است. فشاری که نشانه به فرد وارد می کند و او را به دنیایی دیگر می کشاند.

همان آنی که جرعۀ آمیخته با خرده های شیرینی (مادلن) به دهنم رسید، یکه خوردم. حواسم پی حالت شگرفی رفت که در درونم انگیخته شده بود. خوشی دل انگیزی (شادی، خصوصیت نشانه های محسوس) خود در خود، بی هیچ شناختی از دلیلش، مرا فراگرفت. یک باره با انباشتنم از گوهره ای گرانبها، کشمکش های زندگی را برایم بی اهمیت، فاجعه هایش را بی زیان و گذرایی اش را واهی کرد، به همان گونه که دلدادگی می کند (نشانه های عشق). دیگر خودم را معمولی، بود و نبود یکی، میرا حس نمی کردم.
ج ۱، ص ۱۱۱

در جلسۀ اول گفتیم که هدف اصلی «در جستجوی زمان از دست رفته» رسیدن به تجربۀ ابدیت در دل زمان است، زمانی که دیگر توالی اکنون های نیست شونده نباشد، و این جا اشاره ای صریح به آن را می یابیم. اهمیت نشانه های محسوس در همین است که دریچه ای باز می کند، برای رسیدن به تجربه هایی از این دست در نشانه های هنر. زیرا فراتر رفتن از زندگی میرا، با نشانه های محسوس رخ نمی دهد یا حداقل به طور دائم رخ نمی دهد.

گفتیم که نشانه های محسوس شادی آورند، اما این جا هم مانند نشانه های عشق، سویه ای حزن آور وجود دارد. مثل تجربۀ عاشقانه، این جا هم دنیای مورد اشارۀ نشانه، از دسترس ما خارج است، زیرا نشانه در لحظۀ حاضر است، اما معنا و حقیقتی که به آن ارجاع می دهد در زمان گذشته رخ داده و سپری شده و از بین رفته، و همین سپری شدن باعث حزن می شود (نوستالژی).

نکتۀ مهم این است: گذشته ای که نشانه های محسوس ما را به سوی آن می کشند، گذشته ای نیست که زمانی واقعاً اکنون بوده باشد. کومبره ای که راوی به یادش می افتد، لحظات اکنون کودکی او نیست. بلکه آن چه از کومبره حس می کند حتی در زمان کودکی هم وجود نداشته. دولوز می گوید: گذشته ای که به وسیلۀ نشانه تجربه می شود، «ذات» گذشته است. ذات جهانی است که هیچ وقت کنونی نبوده و در نتیجه، هیچ وقت سپری نشده. همیشه مثل سایه یا همزاد یک اکنون، در اکنون وجود داشته و نداشته. یک جهان بالقوه و مجازی است، که با این همه حقیقی تر است از جهان بالفعل و واقعی.

دولوز نتیجه می گیرد: بر خلاف آن چه رایج است، صحنۀ شیرینی مادلن نوعی «تداعی» نیست. تداعی روانشناسانه این است که فردی در گذشته الف و ب را با هم تجربه کرده، حال با تجربۀ الف به یاد ب می افتد. اما در صحنۀ شیرینی مادلن، گذشته ای که تداعی شده هرگز زندگی نشده است. گاهی آدم به یاد دوران سخت گذشته می افتد، اما این گذشته برایش شیرین است. این نشان می دهد که گذشته ای که به یاد آمده، همان گذشته ای که زندگی شده نیست. بلکه گذشته ایست که «آفریده» شده.

اما، همان طور که پروست می گوید، چون ما این را در نمی یابیم، و تصور می کنیم که به خاطر گذشته ای مادی است که این لذت و اندوه را حس می کنیم، همچنان نشانه های محسوس ایدئال ترین نشانه ها برای رسیدن به حقیقت نیستند.

چهار:‌ نشانه های هنر

[°°°·.°·..·°¯°·._.· ʜᴇʟᴇɴ Ροζουλί Εωσφόρος ·._.·°¯°·.·° .·°°° ★·.·´¯`·.·★ Ⓥⓔⓡⓝⓤⓢ Ⓟⓞⓡⓣⓘⓣⓞⓡ Ⓐⓡⓒⓐⓝⓤⓢ Ταμετούρο Αμ · Rating 5 out of 5]

Αναμφισβήτητα οι πρώτοι πέντε τόμοι του «Αναζητώντας τον χαμένο χρόνο» αντιστοιχούν ο καθένας σε μία ανθρώπινη αίσθηση.
«Η φυλακισμένη», μου έδωσε την αναγκαία αίσθηση της εσωτερικής ακοής, των ερεθισμάτων, κομμάτια γραφής που σαν υλικό απο μία ανέφικτη, ιερή, μητρική, γλώσσα χαρίζει στον Προυστικά μυημένο, φλόγες δροσιάς και επενδύσεις μυστηρίων, σε βωμούς ατομικούς, σαν απο το εσωτερικό της σάρκας που κλονίζεται απο μια γλυκιά διείσδυση.
Μαζί με μία εύγευστη γλυκόπικρη περιγραφή των τελετουργιών της καθημερινότητας.

Εδώ δεν υπάρχει η χρήση του επιφανειακού μέσου, είναι κάπως τρομακτικό το βάθος που σε βυθίζει ο Προύστ σχετικά με τη φύση της ανθρώπινης συνείδησης και την αμφισβητούμενη ικανότητα της σύνδεσης ενός ατόμου με άλλα ανθρώπινα όντα.

Διαβάζοντας με κατάνυξη αυτή την Προυστική Βίβλο της μελαγχολικής ενδοσκόπησης αναρωτήθηκα πολλές φορές πώς γίνεται να με ξέρει τόσο καλά, πως γίνεται να έχει δημιουργήσει ένα πλήθος απο χιλιάδες σελίδες που μέσα τους ανακαλύπτω τον εαυτό μου σε διάφορα σύμπαντα, σε διάφορα βλέμματα, σε χιλιάδες ψυχικά μετενσαρκωμένες ζωές που σέρνονται μέσα σε παλιούς και νέους εαυτούς.
Παράλληλα καταφέρνει απλά να αλλάξει κάθε αντίληψη και να γίνει σημαντικό κομμάτι ζωής. Το δ��αμέτρημα της παραίτησης και της παρατήρησης είναι υπεράνθρωπο και οι χαρακτηρισμοί εξίσου εκπληκτικοί.

Ο Προύστ γίνεται τόσο λεπτομερής σχετικά με τις ψυχολογικές διαδικασίες, που διαβάζοντας τον επαναξιολογείται κάθε σκέψη μας, κάθε συλλογισμός που ίσως είχε απορριφθεί απο το ατομικό μας φίλτρο, επιστρέφει με απίστευτη δύναμη αναθεώρησης και ανάγεται σε αποξενωμένη μεγαλοσύνη, για να μας θυμήσει την πράξη της άγνοιας ορισμένων σκέψεων και καταραμένων προθέσεων.

Απίστευτη εμπειρία για ένα λογοτεχνικό δημιούργημα που σε «διαβάζει» και σε αλλάζει.
Όσο κι αν προσπαθείς να το «διαβάσεις», δεν τα καταφέρνεις ...διότι είναι μοναδικό, δεν μεταφράζεται στην ανθρώπινη γλώσσα, και με όλη τη δύναμη του δημιουργικού μόχθου αγγίζει την ουσία του εαυτού μας σε τέτοιο σημείο ώστε κάθε απάντηση σε οποιοδήποτε ερώτημα να δίνεται μόνο απο την εσωτερική μας ενατένιση. Σε ένα πεδίο ενατένισης απογυμνωμένο και ισχυρό που ανήκει στον κόσμο των αγγέλων.
🖤🖤🖤🖤🖤

Καλή ανάγνωση!
Πολλούς ασπασμούς.!

[Dream.M · Rating 5 out of 5]

حسادت عشق را تشدید می‌کند، از دیدگاه یک عاشق این را می‌گویم"
چقدر با این جمله‌ی کتاب مخالفم، البته در طول کتاب با اتفاقاتی که میوفته، پوچ بودن این جمله ثابت میشه ولی خب تا مارسلِ داستان این رو بفهمه جون خواننده به لب میرسه.
نمیدونم تا حالا توی رابطه‌ی مریض بودید یا نه ، قبلا هم پرسیدم، چندتا جواب هم براش وجود داره ولی کافی نیستن. چون بنظرم بعضی شکلهای رابطه رو توضیح نمیدن.
سوال اینه : واقعا چرا چرا چرا و چی باعث میشه توی رابطه‌‌ای که با پارتنرتون درش خوشحال نیستید باقی بمونید؟
چرا وقتی وارد رابطه با کسی می شید می خوایید تغییرش بدید؟ مگه عاشق شدن در نهایت چیزی غیر از پذیرفتن یک فرد همون‌جوریه که هست؟
........
اسم کتاب به درست‌ترین شکل مناسب انتخاب شده و کل محتوای این جلد رو همین کلمه‌ی " اسیر" برامون فاش میکنه.
توی این جلد مارسل با آلبرتین هم‌خونه میشه( علی رغم تمام شک و تردید‌هاش توی جلد قبل) و با حسادت و عشق بیمارگونه‌اش اون و خودش رو رنج میده .
مثل بقیه جلدها، این کتاب هم پره از توصیفات باشکوه، جزییات ظریف و لطیف، پره از حس های واقعی و شخصیت پردازی که نظیرش رو توی رمانهای داستایفسکی فقط میشه دید. لطیف لطیف لطیف تا اعلاترین حد تصور بشر.
خوندن( شنیدن) این کتاب در مورد خود من حداقل باعث شده دقتم بیشتر بشه و بتونم به هر اتفاق اطرافم جور عمیق‌تر توجه کنم و ازش ساده نگذرم.
قسمتهایی از کتاب هست که مارسل داره صورت و بدن آلبرتین رو توصیف میکنه ، حالتهای خواب و بیداریش رو .وقتی میخنده، وقتی چشم باز میکنه، وقتی حرف میزنه، تاب موهاش، رنگ چشمهاش، حالت دست و پاهایش... با این قسمتهای کتاب خیلی گریه کردم. دلم برای عزیزانم خیلی تنگ شد. دلم سوخت که چرا وقتی بودن با دقت نگاهشون نکردم. چرا من نمیتونم ازشون همچین تصویری که مارسل از البرتین، حتی وقتی غایبه، توی ذهنش بازسازی می کنه، از خواهر و مامانم بازسازی کنم. هزار با کاش و هزار بار حسرت

[Fionnuala]

It will soon be a year since I read this book so writing a review of it now seems almost impossible. How can I ever retrieve all the thoughts I had about the fifth book in Proust’s seven-volume series (actually the eight in my ten-volume edition). It begins to seem like a sadly futile recherche du temps perdu.

And yet, the urge to write something, I often wonder for whom I write my reviews, of course for myself most definitely, it bothers me a lot to leave a book unreviewed now that I have adopted this practice of recording impressions left on my mind by what I have read, that by posting them in a public place, I intend the words to be read by others as in the diaries people wrote hoping they might be published one day and which surely were being censored as they wrote, so yes, I censor as I write and Proust did too, searching for just the right coded formula with which to convey his preoccupations most clearly and most opaquely at the very same time, a neat trick, and confusing sometimes, especially when I try to do it.

Now you are confused too, no doubt, if you are still reading.
Confused not only by the particularly rambling nature of that sentence but also because I included some anacolutha, some breaks in grammatical sequence, but not without a reason, you’ll be relieved to hear. The narrator of La Prisonniere mentions the word anacoluthe when referring to the confusing nature of his lover's speech patterns - she had the habit of breaking grammatical sequence when she spoke, it seems. But what is more interesting even than his commenting on Albertine’s less than coherent meanderings is what he said right afterwards: he tells us that he failed to recall the beginning of one such crooked sentence because ma mémoire n'avait pas été prévenue à temps; elle avait cru inutile de garder copie, his memory hadn’t been warned in time and had not thought it necessary to ‘save’ a copy of the beginning of the sentence. And yes, he wrote that line one hundred years ago.
So, my long, meandering, crookedly expressed argument is building up to a particular point: that my memory, even if it were able, has failed to save a copy of my initial impressions on reading this book.

But fortunately for you I have a way to regain that lost time.
Yes, I can step back in time and reread the online discussions in which I participated here on gr last year while I was reading Proust. So, much to my relief and yours too, I'm guessing, I have been able to reconstruct a review from the comments I posted while I was reading the book. I’m also very grateful for the fact that I participated so actively in the group - I posted many, many comments, almost more than anyone else, I’ve been told. But don’t run away, I’ve edited those comments radically and will also try to observe normal grammatical sequence during the rest of this review.

There is a strand running through Proust’s entire work which is particularly well highlighted in this fifth book of the series: that strand is the continuous interweaving of the sensual and the anxious, du motif voluptueux et du motif anxieux.

While it is present from the beginning of the series when the boy narrator suffers from the constant tension between the exquisite pleasure with which he anticipate his mother’s goodnight kiss and the unbearable anxiety he experiences each evening lest the kiss be withheld, nowhere is it more apparent than in this volume, devoted almost entirely to the Narrator’s alternating feelings for Albertine so that the book becomes an unending waltz between the extremes of passion and perturbation, for the narrator, for Albertine, and sometimes for the reader. I found myself torn between impatience at the narrator’s prevarications over Albertine on the one hand and admiration for the way that the inner world of the narrator as artist had begun to be revealed on the other. Because what is really notable about this fifth book in the series is the shift in mood that takes place during the course of the year or so spanned by this volume, a shift that is mirrored by a change in the narrator’s opinions regarding the music that has been playing in the background since the beginning of the Recherche, the Vinteuil sonata containing the petite phrase that has been the musical motif accompanying many key moments.

In this volume, the narrator discovers some of Vinteuil’s more mature works, a septet in particular where the original phrase he loved so much has been transformed, and which satisfies him in a way that the earlier sonata version fails to do anymore. He likens the sonata to a Bellini angel playing a lute whereas the septet is a Mantegna archangel blowing a military style trumpet .

And what does this trumpet announce? Cette question me paraissait d'autant plus importante que cette phrase était ce qui aurait pu le mieux caractériser - comme tranchant avec tout le reste de ma vie, avec le monde visible - ces impressions qu'à des intervalles éloignés je retrouvais dans ma vie comme les points de repère, les amorces, pour la construction d'une vie véritable: l'impression éprouvée devant les clochers de Martinville, devant une rangée d'arbres près de Balbec.
He seems to be saying that it reminds him of all the embryonic writerly episodes of his life so far; that it is leading him towards his destiny as a writer.

And so we see how the keystones of the entire work were carefully laid in place right at the beginning - we knew that the steeples of Martinville seen from Dr Percepied's carraige as it moved along the twists and turns of the roads around Combray, and the three trees outside Balbec, seen from Mme de Villeparisis's carriage, were each significant episodes but we didn't yet know the role they would play, that their significance would be best explained through Vinteuil's new and transformed 'petite phrase' in this fifth volume of the Recherche in which the narrator works through his passion for Albertine and emerges at the end as the writer he didn’t know he could become.

[Tadas Vankevicius · Rating 4 out of 5]

Prisoner is a captivating and deeply introspective installment in his monumental In Search of Lost Time series. The novel expertly explores themes of love, memory, and identity, delving into the complexities of human relationships with subtlety and elegance. Proust’s prose remains intricate and rich, offering an immersive experience as we follow the narrator's inner journey. His vivid observations and introspective insights provide both a personal and universal lens on the human condition. Prisoner is a thought-provoking and beautifully written work, making it a rewarding read for those who appreciate literary depth.

[Luís · Rating 5 out of 5]

The genius of Proust reaches its peak in The Captive. The complexity of the narrator's feelings for Albertine, her jealousy, her fears, her lies, her initial wishes, and the need for reconciliation are described with such depth that the reader finds himself seized by a tortured brain. Maniac is sensitive to the extreme of a loss by trying to understand himself. In parallel, we witness the terrible fall of Charlus, assassinated by the stupidity and the foolish pride of Verdurins and Morel, who nevertheless allow Proust to touch perfection in the description of the septet Vinteuil. Where the music and life unite so profoundly in the author's endless sentence that it feels like nothing will ever end. We know, however, that Albertine will disappear and that at the very moment when leaving her becomes possible, her disappearance will be the hardest of trials. Nothing had settled in stone with Proust. Everything is in perpetual motion, constantly interrogating the mysterious experience of living.

[J.L. Sutton · Rating 5 out of 5]

"The real voyage of discovery consists, not in seeking new landscapes, but in having new eyes."



Obsessive sexual jealously takes center stage in Marcel Proust's The Prisoner, the fifth installment in his epic, In Search of Lost Time/Remembrance of Things Past. Our narrator has moved his girlfriend, Albertine, into his house, and, in fits of wild jealousy and insecurity, does his best to control her even as he sometimes spurns her. While Albertine is the obvious prisoner of the narrator's power games, she is not the only prisoner. One could argue too that Marcel (now more closely identified with the author than ever before), though not sympathetic, has made himself a prisoner of his own jealousy. It doesn't necessarily sound like the stuff of literary greatness, but even as you are thinking of the narrator as an emotionally abusive jerk, Proust's writing soars.

[sAmAnE · Rating 4 out of 5]

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در این جلد راوی در پاریس زندگی میکنه و گرفتار حسادتیه که معشوقه‌اش، آلبرتین نمی‌تواند آن را تسکین دهد. در اواخر کتاب آلبرتین؛ ‌می‌رود و در جلد بعدی شاهد سرگشتگی و کوشش‌های راوی برای یافتن و شاید بازگرداندنش هستیم....
👒
این جلد برام جالب توجه بود و خیلی راحت‌تر و سریع‌تر پیش می‌رفت ولی بعضی جاها حالات روحی و روانی بیمارگونه‌ی راوی و تردیدها و دودلی‌هایش خیلی آزاردهنده بود، شک و بدبینی راوی به معشوقه‌اش و اینکه نمیدونه بلاخره اون رو بعد از اینهمه مدت طولانی و اتفاقات، دوست داره یا نه حکایت ذهن مریض و بیمارگونه‌ی وی بود؛بخصوص اوایل کتاب.
در کل این مجموعه در دسته‌ی کتاب‌هایی با تعداد جلد بالا و توصیفات زیاد و جملات طولانی قرار گرفته و ممکنه واقعا برای برخی حوصله‌سر بر باشه ولی پیشنهاد می‌کنم بخاطر این دلایل خوندنش رو از دست ندید. هرچند که ممکنه کمی دشوار باشه و خوندنش زمان‌بر و نیازمند صبر و بردباری باشه! کتاب باید با حوصله خونده بشه ولی طبق کتاب "مارسل پروست" اثر اف.دبلیو.جی.همینگز، ترجمه‌ی مهدی سحابی:
"پس از چند صفحه‌ای که از خواندن کتاب بگذره، موجاموج پرشکوه و جریان‌های نهفته در ژرفای روایت خواننده را با خود خواهد برد؛ درخشش خیره کننده‌ی اثر راه او را روشن خواهد کرد، همراهی بیشمار شخصیت‌های کتاب تخیل او را برخواهد انگیخت، کاوش‌های خارق‌العاده، هرچند جدل‌انگیز نویسنده در ژرفاها و سرچشمه‌های انگیزه‌های بشری شناخت او را از نوع بشر غنی خواهد کرد، و همچنین شاید برخی از خوانندگان از تاملات پروست درباره‌ی خیر و شر، زندگی و مرگ و پس از مرگ بهره‌ای بیشتر ببرند..."

[Manny · Rating 3 out of 5]

And so on to La Prisonnière, volume 5 in A la recherche du temps perdu and one of the most depressing books I can remember reading. Knowing full well that it's the last thing he should do, Marcel has invited Albertine to come and live with him in Paris and now spends his time in a hell of jealousy, trying to stop her from meeting her many lesbian lovers and endlessly cross-examining her about her movements. He's aware, both from his own experience and from that of his late friend Swann, that his behaviour is pointless and self-destructive, but he can't control it.

Looking at the introduction and many other places, I see everyone explaining to us that the book is about Proust's brief and tragic relationship with his chauffeur/private secretary/lover Alfred Agostinelli. From the information available, it is indeed easy to see why this theory is popular. On the other hand, I notice this sentence in the book's first paragraph:

Ceux qui apprennent sur la vie d'un autre quelque détail exact en tirent aussitôt des conséquences qui ne le sont pas et voient dans le fait nouvellement découvert l'explication de choses qui précisément n'ont aucun rapport avec lui.

which I might paraphrase as

People who note some striking detail in someone else's life often draw conclusions from it which are entirely incorrect, and see in the fact they have just discovered explanations of things which have absolutely nothing to do with him.

Indeed, on the occasions when I have had an opportunity to check my theories about people's books by asking the authors directly, I've been surprised to see how many times Proust's observation turned out to be accurate. So, maybe not as clear-cut as it seems.

The author of my edition's preface also spends several pages telling us about the book's painstakingly constructed architecture, but refrains from pointing out that it often seems to be a complete mess. There are bizarre plot holes, and sentences are repeated for no obvious reason. Worst, Proust's syntax, always driven to the edge of what's possible for a human being to understand, sometimes goes well past the point of no return. The diligent editor, as conflicted as his author, goes to great lengths in his footnotes to explain that some sentences aren't actually finished and others use pronouns whose reference is almost impossible to deduce from the grammar. In general there are a vast number of obscure words and allusions which complicate the task of understanding what the hell the narrator is talking about.

Why is Proust doing this? He died while he was still correcting the proofs, and some of the inconsistencies must be down to things still being in progress. But I think this is far from being the whole story, and it may not even be an important part of it. It seems to me, rather, that Proust has chosen to convey his narrator's constant pain and confusion by using the grammar to inflect the same sufferings on us, the poor readers. It's a dangerous manoeuvre, and you can only get away with it when you're a brilliant enough writer that you can pull some magical pages out of the hat any time you need them to remind us that you're doing this on purpose; a modern novel which uses the same method with success is Infinite Jest, also a book about obsession.

Although La Prisonnière was often unpleasant to read, when I reached the end I decided I'd been tortured for valid reasons. The narrator spends most of his time in so much pain that his mind isn't functioning properly; indeed he's always telling us he's unable to think. But every now and then, when his attention turns to the redemptive power of art, the mental fog clears, and with it the syntax. The high point of the novel is the musical evening chez Mme Verdurin, which contrasts the sublime beauty of Vinteuil's septet (clearly, and somewhat immodestly, the book itself) with Mme Verdurin's tawdry scheming against Baron de Charlus. We see that the two contrasting themes of the septet correspond to the two themes of the book, the power of art (can art be not just an alternative to life, but actually more real than life?), versus the miseries of romantic relationships.

The opening of Albertine disparue, which I have just started, appears to confirm the above theory: Albertine has left, and the narrator already seems clearer and more coherent. I'm looking forward to following the triumphant development of the artistic theme in the final two volumes.
________________
[And the next day...]

Thirty pages into volume 6, I stand by what I said: at least to my eye, there is a very noticeable difference in the syntax. I'm wondering if I can find some straightforward way to quantify it.

[Warwick · Rating 4 out of 5]

Even by Proust’s standards, the atmosphere of La Prisonnière is neurotic, inward-looking, sickly and claustrophobic. Very little of substance happens in this instalment: there is another extended high-society party at the centre of the book, but on either side we have only scattered, fervid impressions of the narrator’s room, the semi-darkness, the closed curtains, the muffled footsteps…and the unconscious girl.

Albertine is, technically, not actually a prisoner – she can come and go, if chaperoned – but her life in the narrator’s apartment, secret and constrained as it is, does feel like a kind of punishment, and not just for her. All of the French language’s words for confinement are mustered to describe her condition: she is cloîtrée, encagée, enfermée, a captive. And she is, the narrator says, toute à moi – all mine – ‘in my dominating possession’.

This is recounted, though, more in a tone of miserable disillusion than of gloating satisfaction. The Proustian principle is here boiled down to the essentials: On n'aime que ce qu'on ne possède pas, One loves only what one does not possess. Now that he does possess her, his attitude towards her has become one of boredom interspersed with acute flashes of jealousy.

In seclusion, Albertine is scarcely human, indeed scarcely animate – ‘less like a girl than a domestic animal’, he says at one point, and even, when sleeping, compared to a plant. He likes her best like that. Asleep, she has no irritating agency of her own, and the narrator can finally enjoy her in peace.

Je pouvais mettre ma main dans sa main, sur son épaule, sur sa joue, Albertine continuait de dormir. Je pouvais prendre sa tête, la renverser, la poser contre mes lèvres, entourer mon cou de ses bars, elle continuait à dormir, comme une montre qui ne s'arrête pas, comme une bête qui continue de vivre quelque position qu'on lui donne, comme une plante grimpante…

I could put my hand in her hand, on her shoulder, on her cheek; Albertine continued to sleep. I could take her head, turn it round, press it to my lips, put her arms around my neck; she continued to sleep, like a watch still running, like a creature still living whatever position you put it in, like a creeping plant…

These descriptions culminate in a quite extraordinary, Courbet-like fixation on her naked body:

son ventre (dissimulant la place qui chez l’homme s’enlaidit comme du crampon resté fiché dans une statue descellée) se refermait à la jonction des cuisses, par deux valves d’une courbe aussi assoupie, aussi reposante, aussi claustrale que celle de l’horizon quand le soleil a disparu.

her belly (concealing the place which in men is disfigured as though by a stud sticking out of a dilapidated statue) ended at the junction of her thighs, in a bivalve curve that was as soporific, as restful, as cloistral as the curve of the horizon when the sun has disappeared.

Why can’t he just let her go? Because he can’t bear the idea of anyone else having her; and because this jealousy is an essential part of love as he conceives of it. While it’s ‘formed by desire at the start, love is only maintained later by painful anxiety’; la jalousie redouble l’amour. Elsewhere he describes love as ‘reciprocal torture’. And this is heightened in Albertine’s case because of his suspicion that she fancies women, which he cannot bear despite spending his whole time lamenting that she is getting in the way of him being able to pick up new girls himself.

‘What tortured me to imagine with Albertine,’ he says, with characteristically futile self-awareness, ‘was my own desire to appeal to new women, to draft new novels…you could almost say it was a jealousy of oneself.’ It’s a penetrating observation.

Proust’s narrator, in short, is a complete dick: but to point this out is not so much literary criticism as a kind of vague virtue-signalling. More productive, perhaps, is to acknowledge the awful sense of recognition we feel when we read his deepest impulses. What repels in the narrator is not so much his egotism and hypocrisy, but the nuclear honesty with which he describes it, and which forces us, against our will, to relate.

There is a feeling, in Proust, that this kind of unfliching honesty is necessary to make any sense of how he behaves. One of the things his long book is doing is making an insane attempt to bridge the vast gulf between the way people speak and act, and the way they actually feel inside. He talks about this openly for the first time in La Prisonnière, acknowledging his role as novelist:

Mes paroles ne reflétaient donc nullement mes sentiments. Si le lecteur n'en a que l'impression assez faible, c'est qu'étant narrateur je lui expose mes sentiments en même temps que je lui répète mes paroles. Mais si je lui cachais les premiers et s'il connaissait seulement les secondes, mes actes, si peu en rapport avec elles, lui donneraient si souvent l'impression d'étranges revirements qu'il me croirait à peu près fou.

And so my words in no way reflected my feelings. If the reader has only a faint impression of this, it’s because as a narrator I tell him my feelings at the same time as I repeat my words. But if I concealed the former, and if he knew only the latter, my actions, corresponding so little with them, would so often give him the impression of strange changes of opinion that he would think me half mad.

I’m afraid we still do, Marcel. Elsewhere, he shows his characteristic close attention to people’s use of language: the Duc de Guermantes starts saying bel et bien, there is an argument over Morel’s use of the phrase payer le thé, M de Cambremer constantly misuses the word justement, Françoise loses the ‘purity’ of her regional dialect, and a hotel manager calls a pissotière a pistière. As for Albertine, she is criticised for her ‘anacoloutha’, and a major falling-out between her and the narrator hinges on an outburst in which he only catches the word casser, and spends pages obsessing over what phrase she could have been using: casser du bois? casser du sucre? (No: she’s asking for the freedom to go and me faire casser le pot, a slang phrase meaning roughly ‘get taken up the arse’.)

Proust’s own language, despite wallowing in his stagnant relationship, sometimes reaches amazing heights of beauty. There is a fabulous section on the cries of Paris’s street vendors, which reach him through the shuttered windows; and on music, as always, he is ecstatic. Trying to describe the meaning of Vinteuil’s music, he says: ‘we can measure the depth of it, but we can no more translate it into human language than can the disembodied spirits when, summoned by a medium, they are interrogated on the secrets of death’. At its best, Proust’s prose has something of the same speechless, transcendent effect.

[Cloudy · Rating 5 out of 5]

نه فقط روایت جزء به جزء حس و حسادت و اسارت که پره از وجوه مختلف زندگی.
و باز هم جزئیات روح آدمی.
مستقیم به روحم کشیده می‌شه و با درونی‌ترین ابعاد وجودی لمس می‌شه و خب انقدر وسعت داره که چه چیزی می‌شه بنویسم ازش؟

[Hakan · Rating 5 out of 5]

proust romanın bir yerinde kahramanımızın gazeteye gönderdiği bir yazının yayımlanmaya değer bulunmadığı bilgisini verir bize. üstünde hiç durmaz ama, tek cümle sadece, “…yayımlanmamış olduğunu öğrenmem için gazeteye şöyle bir göz gezdirmem yeterli oldu.” cümle biter, konu anında değişir. esas konu aşktır zira o anda, hatta bu romanın tamamında. aşktan devam eder. fakat proust bize verdiği tek cümlelik bilgiyle zamanda, “kayıp zamanda” hangi noktada, hangi konumda olduğunu/olduğumuzu göstermiştir: yazar olmak istediğini önceki ciltlerden bildiğimiz kahramanımız yazmaya başlamış, yazdıklarını yayımlatmak istemiştir ve fakat yazar olmasına çok zaman vardır hala. kahramanımızın yazar olabilmesi için aşkı, hikayesini o an anlatmakta olduğu aşkı, yaşaması gerekecektir. sanata-sanatçıya yaklaşımını ve hatta yüksek sosyete ilgisini “eğitim” olarak değerlendiren kahramanımız aşk eğitimini de tamamlamak zorundadır.

aşkı, kayıp zamanının izinde’nin bu bölümünde, kahramanımızın önce tercihlerini, alışkanlıklarını sonra da bağlı olduğu tüm hayat düzenini sarsan-bozan bir güç olarak görüyoruz öncelikle. kahramanımızın albertine aşkı sevgiden, arzudan doğmuyor. hayatta olduğu gibi zaman ve şartlar, olasılıklar ve rastlantılar tuhaf oyunlarını oynuyor, bir yol açılıyor, bir uç-bir hikaye için başlangıç ucu ve fakat buna rağmen aslında olmayacak-yürümeyecek hikaye kahramanımızın zihninde ilerlemeye başlıyor. zihninde, kahramanımızın zihninde aşkı başlatan duygu kıskançlık: kahramanımız daha önce tanışıp güzel-çekici bulmadığı, sıradan, basit bir kişiliği olduğunu düşündüğü ve şartların-konumların da etkisiyle hakimiyetine alabileceğini sandığı albertine’in kendisinin ulaşamayacağı bir hayatı olduğunu keşfeder, o hayata ulaşmaya çalıştıkça kıskançlığı büyür, kıskançlığı büyüdükçe…

kıskançlık, kıskançlıkla büyüyen aşk bir tutsaklık yaratır sonunda. tutsak eden olur, tutsak olan olur ve elbette bu roller birbirine karışır, değişir, tekrar tekrar-yeniden kurulur. uzun uzun okuruz bunları, aşk hikayesi böylece ilerler. aşk hikayesinin, aşkın, bizim binlerce sayfadır tanıdığımız kahramanımızın hiç bilmediğimiz “özelliklerini” ortaya çıkardığını görürüz önce, ardından bu özelliklerin çoğunun bildiğimiz kahramana hiç de uygun olmadığını-yakışmadığını. şüpheye düşeriz kahramanımız hakkında. aşkla değişmiş, başka biri olmuştur kahramanımız ya da tam tersi kendini bulmuştur, bilemeyiz. kendisi de bilemez, anlayamaz zaten. anlayacağı, anlatacağı zamandan çok uzaklardadır.

[Oguz Akturk · Rating 5 out of 5]

YouTube kanalımda Marcel Proust'un hayatı, bütün kitapları ve kronolojik okuma sırası hakkında bilgi edinebilirsiniz:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n5e0i...

"Kafesin biri bir kuş aramaya çıktı." Franz Kafka

Gözlerimizi kapattığımızda aklımızdan geçen hatıraların uç uca eklenmiş insan izdüşümleriyle çarpışması, tek sese odaklanmaya çalışırken aklımızı işgal eden çok sesli insan koroları ve bu koroların her birinde orkestra şefliği yapmış dünyaca ünlü kıskançlık mefhumunun et ve kemik taşıyıcılarıyla birlikte kendi düşünsel imparatorluğunu kurması. Vedanın başladığı yere koyduğumuz sevgi yorgunu ayaklarımız ile tempoyu belirlemek amacıyla bizden önce varış noktasına gitmeye çabalayan tavşan atletimiz olan tutkularımız.

Hatıraların verdiği acıların tedavisi için bir araya gelmiş olan doktorlar komitesi çaresizdir. Önlerinde kıskançlık hamuruyla yoğrulmuş, acı mayasıyla kıvamını almış dünya üzerindeki bütün ekmekleri kıskandırırcasına aşk adlı oburu doyuran, hakikat uğruna ruhsal açlık çekemeyen bir et yığını vardır. Eczanedeki ilaçların çoktan metastaz etmiş bir kansere çare bulamaması ve hayatları boyunca kendi kutularının içinde kalarak dış dünyaya karşı kayıtsızlığa mecbur olmaları gibi bizim de hapsedilmiş olmayı isteyip ruhsal açlığımızı doyurmak istediğimiz çeşitli bakışlar vardır. Bağışıklık kazanmayı istemek kuşuna karşı yolladığımız tutku kafesi, hapsolduğumuz tımarhanenin gardiyanlarından sadece bir tanesinin adıdır.

"Hafızamız, bir tür eczane, bir tür kimya laboratuvarıdır, elimize tesadüfen sakinleştirici bir ilaç da geçebilir, tehlikeli bir zehir de."
(s. 379) Mahpus

Ne olursa olsun, o kadar hatıranın ardından arkadaşımız olarak kalmasını istediğimiz olur. Arkadaşlık, bilim insanları tarafından henüz keşfedilmemiş bir icattır. Ama o, gider. Gelmesini isteriz, çünkü her gitme güdüsünde içimizde hissettiğimiz acının herhangi bir sözlükte karşılığı yoktur. Doğanın bebekleri olan sözlükler bu duyguyla tanıştırılmamıştır. Onun adını her duyduğumuzda içine düştüğümüz sönmüş yanardağ, bedenlerin sıcaklığıyla birlikte tekrar aktif hale gelir. Cehennemin kıskançlığı da bundandır.

Zamanında notalar, üşüyen bedenlere yorgan olmuştur. Dünya üzerindeki olası bütün müzik besteleme kombinasyonları bu yorgan mafyasında kendilerine vücut bulur. Diğer bakışların ötekileştirdiği bu yalıtılmış sevgi mabedi, kendi anlık coşkularımızın komutanlığında o meçhul kadının varoluşunu ilhak edebilmek üzere kıskançlık teçhizatlarını toplar. Savaşın birbirinden tamamen alakasız organları birbirine katmasına gülen kalp ise bilmek istediği şeyin dışında mümkün olan her şeyi öğrenmişliğiyle elde ettiği sanrılı anatomik egemenliğini, insan vücudunda kan pompalayan bütün damarların uç uca eklenip yaşadıkları Dünya'nın içini daraltması gibi düşünsel bir animasyonun gergin fotoğraf kareleriyle hafızanın karanlık odalarında banyo eder.

"Kıskançlık öyle bir öğrenme hırsıdır ki, onun sayesinde, birbirinden bağımsız tek tek noktalarda, bilmek istediğimiz şeyin dışında mümkün olan her şeyi öğreniriz sonunda." (s. 81) Mahpus

Prometheus'un gündüzleri bir kartal tarafından yenilen karaciğerinin geceleri tekrar yenilenmesi gibi biz de gerçeklik adlı kartala her gün zaman karaciğerimizi yediririz. Gerçeklik açtır, zaman ise yenilenir. Değişmez ve durmadan yinelenen bir rotada birbirine göre simetrik koltuklarda oturan sevgi-nefret, alçakgönüllülük-gurur ve zevk-acı yolcularını taşıyan dünyanın en sesli treni, ardına eklenen sonsuz zaman katarıyla kendisini her durakta yenilenmiş bir vaziyette bulur. Sadece tek bir soluğa mahpus olmanın güzelliği, her durakta çelişki adlı bilet kontrolcüsüyle kendi hissettiklerine uygun bir ezgi bulan hafıza repertuarını, daha önce gitmediği bir şehri ilk kez gören bir turistin karşısına korunma kapsamına alınması gereken beklenmedik bir tarihi eserin çıkma ihtimali heyecanıyla layıklaştırır.

"Bir soluğa hedef oluyorsun; tellerin hışırtısı arasından ansızın bir ezginin belirmesi gibi; havadaki yansımaya benzer bir şey duruyor önünde; ruhunun kargaşası içerisinden sonsuz bir katar çıkmış, ve sanki dünyanın bütün güzellikleri o katarın yolunda durmakta."
(s. 18) Niteliksiz Adam 2 , Robert Musil

Proust'un okurlarının gözlerine mahpusluk eden bu 402 sayfalık hapishane, sarıldığımızda bir termometrenin içindeki cıvanın, bakışlarımızı yüzünde sabitleştirdiğimizde artık hatırlanması imkansız bir damla anne sütünün, uyku ile uyanış arasındaki algı çitinin, bilinçsiz bir çocukluk hatırasındaki masum bisiklet tekerlerinin, zaman kazanında pişmiş ezeli kırışıklık menülerinin yüzeyini şiddetli bir hava muhalefeti çelişkisiyle tanımlı rüzgarın sıyırıp geçmesinin kıskançlığıyla mahkumlarına bir hapsolmuşluk fragmanı sunar.

Sınırsız özgürlüğe kavuşulmasını engelleyen an parmaklıkları, mahkumlarına Proust'un zaman hiyerarşisindeki "ele geçirilen zaman" adlı gardiyanın elindeki anahtarla açılma ya da kitlenme sözünü verir. Kararın mahkuma ait olduğu dünyadaki tek hapishane zaman’dır. Bütün ihtimallerin tükenmediğini gösteren umut ışığı ise hapishanenin duvarlarını kaplayan sanat eserleri, ara sıra zaman mahpuslarının dinletisine sunulan anlık kulak doygunlukları ve dışı kof ögelerle süslü izole bir hayat özünün bomboşluğunu samimiyetle doldurma isteğidir.

"(...) bütün hazlarda, hatta aşkta bile bulduğum hiçlikten farklı, muhtemelen sanat aracılığıyla gerçekleştirilebilecek bir şeyin var olduğu, hayatım bana bomboş görünse de, hiç değilse henüz bütün ihtimallerin tükenmediği umuduydu bu sanki."
(s. 254) Mahpus

Her şeye rağmen Proust ürünü sayfaların mahpusluğunda kendimi onun zaman atmosferinin duygu iklimlerime sirayet ettiği en derin düşünsel okyanusları keşfe çıkan panteist bir edebiyat uzaylısı gibi hissetsem de, Kayıp Zamanın İzinde serisinde ilerledikçe gitgide artan duygulanımlarım kendileri için zamanla daha çok içselleştirme tutuklayıp hapse atacaktır. Bu içselleştirme adlı sanıklarım ise hiçbir zaman aklanamayacakları ve müebbet hapis cezasına çarptırılacaklarını bildiği, tanıyıp tanımadıklarına tam karar veremedikleri bir hakimin karşısına çıkacaklardır. Beyhude savunma metinleri kıskançlık adlı avukatlar ve savcılar tarafından hazırlanmıştır. Mahpuslara cezasını verecek olan aşk adlı hakim ise sanıklarımı orada bekletmek üzere sonsuza dek geç kalacaktır.

"İnsan, iradesiyle hareket ettiği sürece özgürdür; buna karşılık eğer insani tutkuları, yani organizmasından kaynaklanan tutkuları varsa, dolayısıyla doğru düşünemiyorsa, o zaman özgür değildir."
(s. 494) Niteliksiz Adam 1 , Robert Musil

Bir kalpte müebbet hapis cezasına çarptırılanın vay haline!

[Teresa · Rating 5 out of 5]

If I didn't already know from previous volumes that our narrator tells us everything, all of his emotions and thoughts, flitting and fleeting, I might've been thinking at the start of this that he's a psychopath. He anticipates that, as he seems to anticipate everything, by later telling us:

If the reader has no more than a faint impression of these, that is because, as narrator, I reveal my sentiments to him at the same time as I repeat my words. But if I concealed the former and he were acquainted only with the latter, my actions, so little in keeping with my speech, would so often give him the impression of strange revulsions of feeling that he would think me almost mad.

At both the beginning and end of this volume, I experienced my typical exasperation over the narrator's claustrophobic obsessiveness, but the feeling was not long-lasting, as this is arguably the best written installment so far. The authorial intrusions, and their connection with the narrator, are fascinating and exciting. The middle includes, easily, the best salon scene so far, due to the character of Charlus, and the narrator's musings on music and art and their relationship to the understanding of human nature.

I recently perused a volume of Escher's works, so perhaps it's not surprising that I thought of him during Proust's description of a Fortuny dress, which led me to the thought that the relationship between 'prisoner' and 'jailer' (at least for the narrator; he hasn't convinced me of a thing concerning Albertine) is also Escher-like, with one turning into the other and then back again.

[Ehsan'Shokraie' · Rating 5 out of 5]

مرثیه ای برای مرگ پروست.

قلم را برداشته ای از آنچه می نویسی که سال ها از آن گریخته ایم,همچنان که مرگ در پی توست,هر کلمه ای که بر صفحات می نویسی گویی نفی و سخره مرگ است..که اکنون حریفی یافته که در نبرد جاودانگی شکستش خواهد داد..مرگ هراسان شنل سرمایش بر تن می کند,سرمای صبحی پاییزی که چون غم بر سینه ات سنگینی می کند.. و قلب�� که با فشار مضاعف قفسه صدری ات چون پرنده ای در قفسی که لحظه به لحظه تنگ تر می گردد بی تابی می کند..و دستت که همچنان می نویسد..
آنگاه که مرگ نزدیک تر است..عطش هوایت چنان شدید می گردد که گویی هرگز چیزی را بدین سان نخواستیم..ناباورانه از ناکارامدی مجاری تنفسی و ریه هایمان..که گویی به ما خیانت کرده اند در توطئه ای که مرگ بر پا کرده..هوایی نمیرسد.. و دستت که همچنان می نویسد...
لحظه ای به آسمان مات خاکستری زمستان مینگری..به افرادی که در خیابان ها در گذر اند..گام هایی با اطمینان برمیدارند..گام هایی که پاهایت مدت هاست فراموشش کرده اند..از آنرو که تنها دیگر مسیر میان تخت و میزت را تنها به یاد می آورند..آنچه میبینی آسمان یا که مردم نیستند,بلکه زندگی است و پیامی که می دهد..که بی تو نیز ادامه دارد..گویی حتی هم اکنون نیز از تو گذشته..و دستت که همچنان می نویسد..

همچنان که مرگ بر صندلی کنار میز تحریرت که اکنون مدت هاست خالی مانده منتظر نشسته و لبخند می زند..آوای موسیقی ات را میشنوی,انچه تمام عمرت از آن خود پنداشته ای..گویی اما آن آوا نیز اکنون دورتر از تو شنیده می شود..شاید که دیگر کاملا متعلق به تو نیست..همچو مستاجری در روز های اخر اجاره ش به دنبال خانه ای جدید می گردد..چرا که دیگر دراز زمانی بدن تو خانه ش نخواهد ماند..و دستت که همچنان می نویسد..

مرگ اما دشمنی صبور است..هزاران سال در چشمانش همچون پلک زدنی می گذرد..و بالاخره آن روز فرا می رسد,خورشید کم جان زمستان بی اعتنا در آسمان جا گرفته, در صبح سرد زمستانی ای که قلبت دیگر نخواهد زد..ریه ت نیز به نبرد خود پایان می دهد..و ذهنت که گنجینه بشریت بود..چنان آذرخشی در پهنه آسمان تاریک عدم خاموش می شود..و دستت..دستی که دیگر نمی نویسد..
مرگ دستت را از آن خود کرد..آنچه نوشته ای اما جاودانت خواهد ساخت.

[Darwin8u · Rating 5 out of 5]

“We remember the truth because it has a name, is rooted in the past, but a makeshift lie is quickly forgotten.”
― Marcel Proust, The Captive or perhaps The Fugitive (I have now forgotten which)



This is the fifth volume of Proust's In Search of Lost Time/Remembrance of Things Past. In the Captive, Proust's narrator is concerned about who Obama is in love with. The ardor of Speaker Boehner is face-to-face with the serenity of the House's hatred. The happiness that Congress knows is impossible, their fear that they will be rejected in the next election, faces the narrator with a dilemma -- does he leave the President he thinks he loves, or stay with the President he now ceases to love. The Fall, like the Spring of 17 years before, forces the narrator to shut government down to stir his soul to remind him of a vivid more pronounced period. Thinking of Gingrich, Boehner grips his heart in his hands as he discovers that the President has fled and left him alone, all alone, a captive in his own disgraced and ruined House.

[A. Raca · Rating 5 out of 5]

Albertine!

Seride okuduklarım arasında beni en çok çeken bu oldu. Albertine Kayıp'a başlamamak için zor duruyorum. (Başlayacağım sanırım)

Burada sevgili Marcel'imizin Albertine'e duyduğu aşkı ve nefreti çok net hissediyoruz. Diğer kitaplar gibi sosyete dedikodusundan çok Marcel'in kendi kafasındaki mahpusluğunu ve Albertine'i mahpus etmek isteyişini, ondan hem intikam almak isteyip hem kopamayışını okuyoruz.
Bir sonraki kitapta Albertine neler yaptı çok merak ediyorum. Böyle olur işte Marcel efendiiiii!
(Ayrıca O. Pamuk'un özellikle bu kitabı çok sevdiğini düşünüyorum, okuyanlar ne dediğimi anlıyor bence.)

"Sevdiğimiz her insan, hatta bir ölçüde her insan, bizim için Ianus gibidir: Bizden ayrılıyorsa hoşlandığımız yüzünü, sürekli elimizin altında olduğundan eminsek, asık yüzünü gösterir."

"Albertine daha ziyade, beni acımasızca, umutsuzlukla, geçmişi araştırmaya zorlayan bir Zaman tanrıçasıydı."

❤️

[Noel]

Update: No, I am not done with Proust. I’ve come too far to give up now!

During an interval in the performance of Vinteuil’s posthumous septet, various members of the audience chat to the narrator.

But what were their words, which like every human and external word left me so indifferent, compared with the heavenly phrase of music with which I had just been communing? I was truly like an angel who, fallen from the inebriating bliss of paradise, subsides into the most humdrum reality. And, just as certain creatures are the last surviving testimony to a form of life which nature has discarded, I wondered whether music might not be the unique example of what might have been—if the invention of language, the formation of words, the analysis of ideas had not intervened—the means of communication between souls. It is like a possibility that has come to nothing; humanity has developed along other lines, those of spoken and written language. But this return to the unanalysed was so intoxicating that, on emerging from that paradise, contact with more or less intelligent people seemed to me of an extraordinary insignificance.

Although a cursory glance at the way Proust expresses these ideas shows that they aren’t offered as a kind of aesthetic theory but rather, “a possibility that has come to nothing,” I think this passage is still worth focusing on because it highlights the gap between what the Search promises and what it actually delivers. The entirety of the Search can be read as a celebration of art’s capacity to transcend the material of its signs and express the artist’s true self, a communication that is otherwise impossible, Proust maintains, even, especially, in love. Yet few works of art actually achieve this. Music—good music—is the limit point. Literature, however (more specifically, prose narrative), more often than not, is too weighed down by the burden of flesh-and-blood characters, concrete events, and linear time schemes to place us in intimate contact with the artist’s self. The true expression of the self (or the expression of the true self), in book form, would have to be a stream-of-consciousness narrative that washes over the reader like music rather than prose. The Search’s subject matter is therefore, in theory at least, only an excuse or point of departure for presenting the narrator’s experience of his own consciousness—the “honeycombs,” Walter Benjamin wrote, from which Proust “built a house for the swarm of his thoughts.” And yet… and yet… can we say that Proust has succeeded in achieving even half of his artistic aims when thousands upon thousands of his novel’s pages are dominated by the kind of idle chatter that supposedly failed to penetrate the narrator’s (Proust’s) interiority? The novel’s ostensible subject matter (i.e., society, jealousy, sexuality—which I do find interesting but not the way Proust writes about it) overwhelms its real subject matter (i.e., the self), which is always already overwhelmed by the prolix style. (Proust’s atavistic longing for a world free of literary encrustations would be almost comical if it weren’t so earnest!) I do understand the reason for the prolixity: Proust tries to communicate

all the residuum of reality which we are obliged to keep to ourselves, which cannot be transmitted in talk, even from friend to friend, from master to disciple, from lover to mistress, that ineffable something which differentiates qualitatively what each of us has felt and what he is obliged to leave behind at the threshold of the phrases in which he can communicate with others only by limiting himself to externals, common to all and of no interest

And, indeed, he succeeds, in those moments of intense lyricism, when the soul of the narrator becomes an ecstatically vibrating harp, but those moments are now so few and far between that the prolixity overwhelms and subverts its own end.

As another reviewer writes, for the narrator, the Vinteuil sonata gave only a hint of the greatness to come in this septet, like a ray of light through a half-opened door:

if at [Vinteuil’s] death he had left behind him—excepting certain parts of the sonata—only what he had been able to complete, what we should have known of him would have been, in relation to his true greatness, as little as, in the case of, say, Victor Hugo, if he had died after the Pas d’Armes du Roi Jean, the Fiancée du Timbalier and Sarah la Baigneuse, without having written a line of the Légende des Siècles or the Contemplations: what is to us his real work would have remained purely potential, as unknown as those universes to which our perception does not attain, of which we shall never form any idea.

But Swann’s Way and Young Girls in Flower were so much better than the rest of these books…

All this is to say, I’m disappointed with Proust, and with literature in general. But maybe it’s my fault for expecting so much. (What could be more Proustian?) I want every book I start to be my salvation—to free me from myself, from the loneliness to which I seem to be tied for life. “A book must be the axe for the frozen sea within us,” Kafka wrote. If only this kind of book were easier to find!

Anyway, I think I’m finally done with Proust.

(I still think he’s a great writer.)

[Michael Perkins · Rating 4 out of 5]

Virginia Woolf on Proust....

https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/7013...

---------------

For it is not one universe but millions, almost as many as the number of human eyes and human intelligences, that wake up every morning.

Proust's homosexuality. From the Introduction....

There is a temptingly easy explanation for the preponderance of this theme: Proust himself was a homosexual. Though he never admitted his orientation in his writings, it was an open secret among his Parisian friends, and the topic has been extensively explored by biographers since his death. From this it was a short step to interpreting the relationships in his novels as disguised versions of homosexual relationships in his life. As the joke went, “In Proust, you have to understand that all the girls are boys.” In particular, The Prisoner was seen as a rewriting of Proust’s relationship with his chauffeur Alfred Agostinelli, to whom he undoubtedly had a strong, possessive attachment and with whom—though this is not certain—he may have had sexual relations. A certain amount of trivial gender reassignment does seem to be going on in The Prisoner: it is very curious that in the narrator’s Paris all the young people who bring goods to the house and whom he watches from the window, and all messengers except telegram boys, are girls: were there no delivery-boys in Paris in 1900?

But one really cannot accept Albertine as a chauffeur in a wig. The narrator is too obviously fascinated by her very femininity: her shape and coloring, her clothes, hair, speech, pursuits, her relationship to other women (and also, alas, other more stereotyped traits like her impulsiveness, fickleness and economy with the truth). Proust had several close emotional friendships with women, and seems to have been particularly fascinated by young girls. It is almost as if in this book he is conducting a thought-experiment, trying to imagine what it would be like to have such a being sharing one’s living-space

===========

What seems above all to make the narrator’s life worth while is the simple sensory experience of living: variations in the weather, the sound of street cries, the sight of landscapes, architecture or human features, even—perhaps especially—those of people he does not know. He can appreciate all these better, it seems, in the absence of the person with whom he is in love, or indeed of any person he knows well, or who knows him. The excitement of freedom and the joy of one’s own company are among the strongest themes of The Prisoner. He is gradually learning that this is his path of happiness, not forever hobnobbing with the snob set or absorbed with possessive love.

====

Observing Albertine while she slept....

https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/6663...

=====

Once we pass a certain age, the soul of the child we used to be and the souls of the dead from whom we spring come and scatter over us handfuls of their riches and their misfortunes, asking to bear a part in the new feelings we are experiencing: feelings which allow us, rubbing out their old effigies, to recast them in an original creation.

======

The art of procrastination...

Sometimes, on days when the weather was pronounced hopelessly bad, just living in a house placed at the center of steadily falling rain had the gentle smoothness, the calming silence, the absorbing interest of a sea-voyage; then, on a bright day, simply lying still in bed would allow the shadows to pivot around me as if around a tree-trunk. Or else, from the first sound of the bells of a nearby convent, few and hesitant as their early morning worshippers, barely lightening the dark sky with their tentative showers of sound which were fused or broken up by the warm wind, I had already recognized one of those stormy days, mild and unpredictable, when the roofs, briefly dampened by rain, then dried by a breath of wind or a ray of sunshine, poutingly display a few drops and, as they wait for the wind to turn again, preen in the passing sunshine the rainbow glints of their shot-silk slates; one of those days which is filled with so many changes in the weather, so many atmospheric incidents, so much turbulence, that the lazy man feels he has not wasted it, since he has taken an interest in all the activity that the atmosphere, failing any action on his part, has undertaken in his place.

Days like those times of rioting or war that do not seem empty to the schoolboy missing his classes, since, hanging around outside the Palais de Justice or reading the newspapers, he has the illusion that the unfolding events replace the work he is not doing, developing his intelligence and excusing his idleness; days, in a word, to which we can compare those which bring our lives to some exceptional crisis and which make the man who has never done anything believe that he will, if all turns out happily, adopt new habits of diligence....But he goes on finding the same objections to pleasures, to outings, to journeys, to everything of which he feared for a moment being deprived by death; life is enough to cut him off from them. As far as work is concerned—since extreme circumstances exaggerate what was already present in a man, diligence in the hard worker and laziness in the idler—he awards himself a holiday.

=====

The eccentric Marcel Proust....

According to Léon Pierre-Quint, an early biographer, young Proust...

"looked like a cross between a refined dandy and an untidy medieval philosopher. He wore poorly knotted cravats under a turned-down collar, or large silk shirtfronts from Charvet in a creamy pink whose exact tint he spent a long time tracking down. He was slender enough to indulge in a double-breasted waistcoat, and sported a rose or an orchid in the buttonhole of his frock coat. He wore very light-colored gloves with black points, which were often soiled and crumpled; these he bought at Trois Quartiers because Robert de Montesquiou bought his there. A flat-brimmed top hat and a cane completed the elegant look of this slightly disheveled Beau Brummell. Even on the hottest days of summer he had on a heavy fur-lined coat, which became legendary among those who knew him.”

========

The are three ways in The Search for Lost Time that the narrator looks for meaning: 1) becoming a member of the aristocratic smart set, 2) obsessive love, and, 3) art.

In this volume the reader gets a massive dose of his obsessive love as directed toward Albertine. It is controlling to the point of being sociopathetic. Albertine lives in the old family digs in Paris in a separate room from the narrator. The faithful Francoise is also present to keep the place functioning.

While the narrator is largely homebound, Albertine is allowed to go out and party. But he has the chauffeur and others spy on her as he remains insanely jealous about what she might be up to.

The effect of this is for both Albertine and the narrator to get caught in an increasingly tangled web of lies. There's hardly a lick of truth in what they say to each other.

On a less detailed level, there is the parallel obsession of the aging Baron de Charlus ("The Old Queen") who is very jealous of his bisexual male lover, Morel, who is engaged to a young woman.

.

[Antonio Luis · Rating 5 out of 5]

Puede parecer complicado justificar cinco estrellas porque lo cierto es que la voz del narrador me ha parecido claramente misógina, como poco; posesiva, desde luego. De ahí el título de la prisionera, es un deseo de poseer, no de amar.
En muchos momentos me ha llegado a molestar la visión tan pobre y triste hacia Albertine, y eso sería lo de menos, porque en otros momentos la conducta del narrador me resulta asquerosa y criminal. Ella es un objeto. Y por muy ruin y machista que resulte esa conducta, o precisamente por eso, Marcel Proust ha realizado un retrato genial de ese falso amor que incluso hoy lo reconocemos como actual. Es una exploración ejemplar de los celos y del deseo egocéntrico, un análisis minucioso de la obsesión de una persona tóxica.

Y a esto le da forma con un estilo sublime, el ritmo en esta ocasión me ha parecido perfecto, diría que ha sido hasta ahora mi volumen preferido respecto a los cuatro anteriores; mantiene sus frases larguísimas, llenas de matices, asociaciones e imágenes, y logra convertir en arte estos pensamientos íntimos del narrador, a veces contradictorios y casi siempre obsesivos.
Continúa con la forma de narrar el tiempo, ligado ahora a la experiencia de posesión y pérdida: el narrador cree que al retener físicamente a Albertine controla el paso del tiempo… pero el tiempo se escapa igual.
Y aunque el contexto histórico sería la alta burguesía francesa de hace un siglo, la temática sigue siendo actual en muchas relaciones, y hace que esta obra sea universal.

[Theo Logos · Rating 3 out of 5]

”I felt that my life with Albertine was, on the one hand, when I was not jealous, mere boredom, and on the other hand, when I was jealous, constant suffering.”

All Albertine all the time is a deadly bore. For much of The Captive, that is what this installment of Proust’s mega novel felt like. Were Albertine to tell her own story she might be a fascinating young lady, but Marcel’s relationship with her is stifling and deadly dull. From his priggish compunctions against her suspected sapphic desires to his neurotic twitch of only desiring her when his jealousy is aroused, Marcel’s relations with Albertine are a litany of unrelieved monotony.

Relationships in Proust all jell in the same mold. Starting in Swann’s Way with the novella length segment on Swann’s affair with Odette, Proust created the great theme with repeated variations. All turn on the link between jealousy and desire, love as possession. Saint-Loup’s affair with Rachel is a trivial variation. Even the “inverted” affair between the Baron de Charlus and the conniving Morel sound a minor cord variation on this theme. The original theme in Swann’s Way had a grand, tragic sweep. The chapters here devoted to Marcel’s jealous fretting over Albertine seem petty and trifling by comparison.

The Captive was rescued from the tedium of Marcel and Albertine by the reappearance of the viperous Verdurins and their little clan in the book’s second half. A musical entertainment, hosted by the Verdurins but arranged by the Baron de Charlus sets up an epic conflict between the nasty, conniving Verdurins and the indefatigable snobbery of Charlus. This showdown between characters who emerged as the most fascinating studies in the novel justifies its existence.

Two significant deaths also added interest. Swann’s death had been signaled since book two, and his grave illness noted in both books three and four. Here, in The Captive, Proust finally described Swann’s last day and passing. Perhaps even more significant than the passing of Swann was the death of Bergotte. This writer had served as a sort of doppelgänger for Proust, the writer. As The Captive was publish posthumously, it almost seemed that the scenes devoted to Bergotte’s demise were a stand in for our author. Certainly these words, written about Bergotte, could stand as an epitaph for Proust:

”the idea that Bergotte was not wholly and permanently dead is by no means improbable. They buried him. But all through the night of mourning in the lighted windows, his books arranged three by three kept watch like angels with out spread wings, and seemed for him who was no more the symbol of his resurrection.”

[Kansas · Rating 5 out of 5]

https://kansasbooks.blogspot.com/2024...

“Lo que nos une a los seres son esas raíces, esos innumerables hilos que constituyen los recuerdos de la noche anterior, las esperanzas de la mañana siguiente; esa trama continua de hábitos de la que no podemos desprendernos."


Hasta llegar a este quinto volumen, he sido testigo de cómo Marcel desde niño llega a la vida adulta capeando ciertos temporales más bien íntimos. Ha pasado la primera parte de su vida absorto en si mismo y realmente ya con veintitantos años sigue perdido en sí mismo, en sus propias sensaciones en las que es evidente que cuando más infeliz se siente es cuando se le obliga a ausentarse de sí mismo. En "La Prisionera", se encuentra con otro conflicto en torno a lo que será la posesión sobre otra persona, los celos, el dominio sobre este otro ser humano, le obligarán de alguna forma a tener que vivir en una especie de superficie de sí mismo en la que no se siente cómodo. Egoísta, autoindulgente, snob en el más puro sentido de la palabra, Marcel sigue siendo una persona, que apenas ha tenido un mínimo de empatía por otra persona, si exceptuamos a su abuela, claro está. Todos le acabaran decepcionado a medida que traba amistades, conocidos, amores, e incluso se puede decir que este narrador/autor apenas le importa nadie un rábano y me refiero concretamente al ejemplo del icónico Swann durante esta novela. Proust y Marcel que son el mismo ente, después de haberle dedicado el maravilloso primer volumen casi por entero a Charles Swann, en este quinto apenas le dedicará dos frases en sus últimos días (esto me ha dolido en el alma). Es cierto, conocemos los defectos ya a estas alturas de Proust/narrador, pero así y todo no deja de ser una obra fascinante por el hecho de ver cómo Marcel ansía a toda costa escapar de esa concentración en si mismo, conectar con gente, mostrar curiosidad por todo, por el arte, en definitiva por todo lo que no se refiere a sí mismo, y finalmente siempre acaba decepcionado y sufriendo: la bofetada con la realidad forma parte del crecimiento. Marcel ansía una vida más allá de sí mismo y realmente aparte de la memoria y del tiempo, éste es para mi el gran tema de "En Busca Del Tiempo Perdido".


“Dijo que por fin veía la razón de que, en aquella época de mi vida, nunca quisiera salir. Se equivocaba, pues la realidad, aunque sea necesaria, no es completamente previsible; los que se enteran de algún detalle exacto sobre la vida de otro sacan enseguida consecuencias que no lo son y ven en el hecho recién descubierto la explicación de cosas que precisamente no tienen ninguna relación con él.“


Esta tela de araña de situaciones, conexiones y encuentros conforma el universo que retrata Proust siempre poniendo a su narrador en el centro. Este narrador, escritor en ciernes, y que sin embargo apenas se menciona esta vida literaria aunque esté en el aire, se debate en un conflicto continuo entre su soledad y la ansiada vida social. En los anteriores volúmenes hemos conocido primero al Marcel protegido por su familia pero también incomprendido y sumido en sí mismo; más tarde, socializando con la casta aristocrática, admirada y envidiada por él desde siempre, hasta que llegado un punto y ya consiguiendo mezclarse entre ellos, sufrir la decepción de la corrupción y la vacuidad de estos aristócratas que tanto admiraba y añoraba conocer. Conocerlos ha supuesto otra decepción. En "La Prisionera" pasaremos a otra fase en la [in]madurez de Marcel: ¿qué hacer cuando ya lo Imposible o lo que había sido Inaccesible ya has conseguido poseerlo? “¿Para qué voy a buscar un alma misteriosa, a interpretar un rostro, a sentirme rodeado de sentimientos que no me atrevo a penetrar?”


“Me preguntaba si no malograría mi vida casándome con Albertine, haciéndome asumir la obligación, demasiado pesada para mí, de consagrarme a otro ser, obligándome a vivir ausente de mí mismo por su presencia continua y privándome para siempre de los goces de la soledad.“


No creo que ésta sea precisamente la mejor de las cinco novelas que llevo hasta ahora leídas de esta serie, imagino que porque Proust la estuvo retocando hasta el final en su lecho de muerte, y no pudo terminar de redefinirla, pero de todas formas, contemplo cada una de las novelas como parte de una única obra, así que aunque acabara con la impresión de que por sí sola, no aporta tanto como las anteriores, sí que es cierto que no habría forma de obviarla cuando pensamos en el conjunto de "En Busca Del Tiempo Perdido". Marcel ya en este punto de la historia ha conseguido llevarse a vivir con él a Albertine con la promesa de un matrimonio. Ambos viven juntos aunque es una convivencia que a la larga resultará mucho más compleja de lo que parecía a simple vista: “Y me daba cuenta de que Albertine no era para mí (pues si su cuerpo estaba en poder del mio, su pensamiento escapaba al dominio de mi pensamiento) la maravillosa cautiva con la que había creído enriquecer mi morada, sin dejar de ocultar su presencia incluso a los que iban a verme y no la sospechaban al final del pasillo en el cuarto vecino.” La complejidad de esta relación viene dada por el hecho de que Marcel convierte a Albertine en una cautiva en su propia casa, la aísla de sus amigas, la controla, la esconde, pero incluso va más allá, espiando sus pasos en su propia casa/cárcel, en la que una de las reglas será que Albertine no podrá entrar en su habitación a menos que él lo autorizara antes.


“De suerte que su encanto, un poco incómodo, era estar en la casa, más que como una muchacha, como un animal doméstico que entra en una habitación, que sale, que se encuentra donde menos se espera.”


Durante toda la novela, realmente desde el mismo momento en que el enamoradizo Marcel conoce a Albertine en Balbec tres libros atrás, Marcel no podrá desligarse de esa imagen idílica del principio de Albertine empujando la bicicleta con una boina verde rodeada de amigas. Para él en aquel momento Albertine no es un individuo con mente propia sino que al visualizarla la ha convertido en una idealización en su mente, así que entre ese primer momento en la playa de Balbec y este quinto volumen se narrará todo ese abismo de desesperación por parte de Marcel porque le ha resultado imposible mantener ese ideal: “Me daba cuenta de que mi vida con Albertine no era más que, por una parte, cuando no tenía celos, aburrimiento; por otra parte, cuando los tenía, sufrimiento.” Es tan simple como el hecho de que una vez que la posee, sus sentimientos cambian y Albertine se convierte en una especie de mascota. Marcel que ha sido un voyeur en toda regla desde el primer minuto de esta serie, siempre espiando tras ventanas, en las reuniones sociales o agazapado en alguna calle esperando, mirando, observando, ahora desde su casa reconvierte este voyeurismo en un control absoluto sobre Albertine que se verá obligada a mentir para salir del paso de mucha parte de este control. El voyeurismo de Marcel, presente durante toda la serie es una forma de estar presente pero al mismo tiempo también ausente de todo lo que pudiera implicarle emocionalmente. No nos olvidemos que Marcel tenía terror a que le obligaran a vivir ausente de sí mismo. Este control que ejercerá ahora desde la casa/cárcel sobre Albertine, es otra forma de Ausencia/Presencia pero mucho más invasiva en este caso.


“De este modo, su sueño realizaba, en cierta medida, la posibilidad del amor: solo, podía pensar en ella, pero me faltaba ella, no la poseía; presente, le hablaba, pero yo estaba demasiado ausente de mí mismo para poder pensar. Cuando ella dormía, yo no tenía que hablar, sabía que ella no me miraba, ya no tenía necesidad de vivir en la superficie de mi mismo.”


¿Y cómo se defenderá Albertine de esta posesión y de este control? Ella tiene sus armas, sobre todo miente, aunque la mayor parte del tiempo se comporte como una esclava o una mascota obediente. Sin embargo, y sobre todo, duerme. El estado durmiente de Albertine será el único momento en el que Marcel creerá amarla, porque cuando está despierta ella recupera su individualidad y su mente y de esta forma él volverá a distraerse en el sentido de le obligará de nuevo a ausentarse de si mismo por el sufrimiento que le ocasionan los celos, o porque no podrá dominarla completamente. Así que la defensa de Albertine ante Marcel será el dormir, mentir, incluso pasando por lesbiana y finalmente ausentándose del mundo.


“Incluso cuando comenzaba a mirar a Albertine como un ángel músico maravillosamente patinado y que me felicitaba de poseer, no tardaba en volver a serme indiferente; en seguida me aburría a su lado, pero esto duraba poco: solo amamos aquello en que buscamos algo inasequible, solo amamos lo que no poseemos, y en seguida volvía a darme cuenta de que no poseía a Albertine.”


- Primero Marcel hace pensar a Albertine que se quiere casar con ella, aunque es consciente de que no la quiere y que ella le aburre.

- Desde el momento en que ella se instala en su casa, consigue aislarla de todas sus amigas a quienes considera una distracción para ella. La esconde de sus visitas.

- Sus celos le harán buscar excusas como el presunto lesbianismo de ella y de sus amigas, aunque nunca empleará esta palabra sino “el tipo de mujer a la que me opongo”, una forma despectiva cuando realmente ese desprecio no lo empleará con la homosexualidad latente e imperante entre la mayoría de sus conocidos.

Así que en esta Prisionera tendremos el tratado perfecto de cómo alguien pretenderá poseer a otro ser humano bajo la excusa del amor, hoy lo llamamos toxicidad, en aquella época no sé… celos, aunque la palabra se queda corta, diría yo: “A lo mejor, semana a semana, podemos llegar muy lejos; ya sabes que lo provisional puede llegar a durar siempre”


“A partir de cierta edad, por amor propio, son las cosas que más deseamos las que aparentamos que NO nos interesan. Pero en el amor la simple habilidad - que, por otra parte, no es la verdadera inteligencia - nos obliga bastante pronto a este genio de duplicidad

Es decir, que mis palabras no reflejaban en absoluto mis sentimientos.
Si el lector no tiene de esto más que una impresión bastante ligera, es porque, como narrador, expongo mis sentimientos a la vez que le repito mis palabras.”


Tal como confía Proust/narrador al lector en un momento dado: “Y en el amor es más fácil renunciar a un sentimiento que perder una costumbre”, todo este quinto volumen casi que gira alrededor de cómo Marcel puede deshacerse del ser largamente anhelado y que ya le aburre, y esto es lo fascinante de toda serie porque la gracia no está precisamente en si Marcel nos cae mejor o peor, o en sí conseguirá liberarse de su insatisfacción en algún momento, sino en los pasajes de pura introspección sobre los temas de siempre: la infancia, el amor, la muerte y la temporalidad, los sueños (una acción en sí misma) y de cómo lo revela a través de la sintaxis, de estas largas frases que en sí mismas contienen la cadencia de esta vida interior de Marcel.


“Pues así como al principio el amor está formado de deseos, más tarde solo lo sostiene la ansiedad dolorosa. Sentía que una parte de la vida de Albertina se me escapaba. El amor es la ansiedad dolorosa como en el deseo feliz, es la exigencia de un todo. Solo nace, solo subsiste si queda una parte por conquistar. Solo se ama lo que no se posee por entero.”

♫♫ ♫ Me Voy - Cat Power ♫♫ ♫

En Busca Del Tiempo Perdido #1: Por el camino de Swann
En Busca Del Tiempo Perdido #2: A la sombra de las muchachas en flor
En Busca Del Tiempo Perdido #3: El mundo de Guermantes
En Busca Del Tiempo Perdido #4: Sodoma y Gomorra






La Captive, 2000, Chantal Akerman

[Yann · Rating 5 out of 5]

Encore un tome sympathique, qui se dévore, et qui nous plonge cette fois dans les méandres de la jalousie et de la frustration du narrateur. L'auteur prend tout le temps nécessaire pour examiner les moindres mouvements de l'âme de son héros, sans jamais craindre d'être trop long en coupant les cheveux en quatre. Mais on le suit sans rechigner.

Suave, mari magno, turbantibus aequora ventis, e terra magnum alterius spectare laborem; non quia vexari quemquamst iucunda voluptas, sed quibus ipse malis careas quia cernere suavest.
Lucrèce; De La Nature Des Choses; II, 1-4

A mesure que l'on avance, on commence à sentir l'unité de l’œuvre, et les thèmes abordés dans les tomes précédents résonnent plus logiquement les uns avec les autres. J'ai particulièrement apprécié les références à l'histoire grecque, et surtout à la littérature russe, vers la fin, ainsi que le petit clin d’œil à l'insupportable Mme de Genlis, ce qui m'a remémoré ses Mémoires:

Si je viens avec vous à Versailles, je vous montrerai le portrait de l'honnête homme par excellence, du meilleur des maris, Choderlos de Laclos, qui a écrit le plus effroyablement pervers des livres, et juste en face de celui de Madame de Genlis qui écrivit des contes moraux et ne se contenta pas de tromper la duchesse d'Orléans, mais la supplicia en détournant d'elle ses enfants.

Un bon roman...

[Zahra Mahboubi · Rating 5 out of 5]

بله، باید می‌رفتم، وقتش بود. از زمانی که دیگر آلبرتین سرسنگین نمی‌نمود، دستیابی بر او دیگر به نظرم نعمتی نمی‌آمد که در عوضش آماده باشی همه‌چیز را وابگذاری. شاید از آن‌رو که چنین می‌کنی تا از اندوهی، از دلشوره‌ای رها شوی، اما دیگر به آرامش رسیده‌ای. موفق شده‌ای از گردهٔ پارچه‌ای بگذری که چندگاهی پنداشته بودی هرگز از آن گذشتن نتوانی. توانسته‌ای آسمانِ رگباری را روشن کنی، صفای لبخند را برگردانی. رمز اضطراب‌آور نفرتی با انگیزهٔ ناشناخته، و شاید بی‌پایان، گشوده شده است. پس خود را دوباره با مسألهٔ موقتاً کنار گذاشتهٔ شادکامی‌ای رویارو می‌یابی که شدنی می‌دانی. اکنون که زندگی با آلبرتین دوباره ممکن شده بود، حس می‌کردم از آن جز ناکامی نصیبم نخواهد شد چون دوستم نداشت. بهتر بود او را با شیرینی موافقتش ترک کنم، که سپس به یاری خاطره تداومش می‌دادم...

پایان جلد پنج، سوم اردیبهشت سال ۰۴

[David · Rating 5 out of 5]

I loved this book. Proust is all about people, and in particular, relationships.

Ah young love. You meet someone. You are attractive and you have things in common. Sparks fly. You move in together. « L’amour c’est l’espace et le temps rendus sensibles au cœur. » Things are great.

Then you notice your differences. She likes golf; you have your books. She likes airplanes; you stick to trains. She is attracted to contemporary arts; you like the masters. She likes music, especially the modern Vinteuil; you like the classics, Wagner. Things are changing.

She likes her young female friends. A lot. You are jealous. Maybe too jealous. « La jalousie est aussi un démon qui ne peut être exorcisé, et revient toujours incarner une nouvelle forme.» You need to exorcise those demons. But you can’t, no matter how hard you try.

You want out; she wants her freedom. You are prisoners of that relationship. She has other interests, maybe superficial, on one level; deeper on the other. He has his. She starts to lie; he does the same. A cycle starts, the end is in sight.

But Marcel can’t let go. He knows what he must do but her “beauty” traps him. She tells him he is too nice. Is it that old adage, nice guys finish last? He watches her sleep. Creepy.

I had this thought. The book is called “the prisoner” and is in the feminine form, referring to Albertine, la prisonnìere. Albertine is in love with other women, she is from Gomorrah. To me, she is all about freedom. She wants her life but on her terms.

Marcel? He is a prisoner too. He represents the bourgeois wealth. He admires all those snobs. He is old school. He is a prisoner of all that wealth, the connections and the royals. He wants pretty Albertine to admire; to possess. He wants to keep her. A prisoner. Marcel called this a sad comedy. Who is laughing?

« Helas! Tout est changé. » Nothing stays the same. Read to find out. So good.

A footnote. Throughout these books the elegant Parisian woman (especially our dear Albertine) desired to wear a dress “a la Fortuny.” So chic, so elegant, so Greek. Greek? As in the ancient a Greek chiton, what women wore back then. Wrap it in silk and voila. C’est chic! This was his inspiration. Who knew?

Furthermore, Fortuny was a Spaniard, born in Granada; died in Venice. This is the 150th year of his birth in 1871; died in 1949. See more: La vida de Mariano Fortuny, el genio granadino que nadie reivindica en España
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https://elpais.com/icon-design/2021-0...

[Teresa · Rating 5 out of 5]

(Eugène Vidal, Girl restings on her arms)

"A arte extraída do real mais familiar existe efectivamente, e o seu domínio talvez seja o mais vasto. Mas não é menos certo que um grande interesse, e às vezes beleza, pode nascer de acções decorrentes de uma forma de espírito tão distante de tudo aquilo que sentimos, de tudo aquilo em que acreditamos, que nem sequer conseguimos compreendê-las, de tal modo que se desenrolam à nossa frente como um espectáculo sem causa. Que existirá de mais poético que Xerxes, filho de Dario, mandando açoitar com vergastas o mar que engolira os seus navios?"

"...não é verdade que é a arte, a arte de um Vinteuil [músico], como a arte de um Elstir [pintor], exteriorizando nas cores do espectro a composição íntima desses mundos a que chamamos indivíduos e que, se não fosse a arte, nunca conheceríamos? Asas, e outro aparelho respiratório, que nos permitissem atravessar a imensidade, não nos serviriam de nada. Porque se fôssemos a Marte e a Vénus mas conservássemos os mesmos sentidos, eles revestiriam tudo o que pudéssemos ver do mesmo aspecto das cores da Terra. A única verdadeira viagem, o único banho de Juventa não consistiria em partir para novas paisagens, mas em ter outros olhos, em ver o universo com os olhos de outro, de cem outros, em ver os cem universos que cada um deles vê, que cada um deles é; e eis o que podemos fazer com um Elstir, com um Vinteuil, com os seus semelhantes: voar na verdade de estrela em estrela."

"Enterraram-no, mas durante toda a noite fúnebre, nas vitrinas iluminadas, os seus livros, arrumados em grupos de três, velavam como anjos de asas abertas e pareciam ser, para aquele que já não existia, o símbolo da sua ressurreição."

[Alireza · Rating 5 out of 5]

این احساس دل شکستگی بعد از پایان هر جلد از کجا میاد؟!
پ.ن: کاملا بی ربط ولی بعضی از کتابا هستن که با یک آهنگ برای من گره میخوره چون معمولا توی زمان استراحت بین شروع مجدد کتاب چندبار به اون آهنگ گوش میدم و با این جلد " در جستجو.." این آهنگ هم برای من جاودانه شد:
Ben Howard - End of the Affair
و ترکیب این حس پایان کتاب و این آهنگ و مقاله ای که دیروز از خانم ویرجینیا وولف خوندم چیز عجیب و غریبی شده.