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Marcel Proust: Selected Letters 1880-1903
Book by Kolb, Philip
405 pages, Paperback
First published December 31, 1983
6 people are currently reading
97 people want to read
About the author
Marcel Proust
2,156 books7,464 followersMarcel 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.
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.
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Displaying 1 of 1 review
January 10, 2014
She opened the door and walked directly to her regular place at the table next to the window that overlooked the quad in the University’s library. When I heard the door open, I looked at my watch, smiled and waited with anticipation. For the past month, as of habit, she had come in every week day at 9 a.m. and had left on the dot of 10. The other day she was late by five minutes and I kept on thinking, surely she must come and then, as I breathed a sigh of relief, she did. Yes, she was indeed a striking individual with a face full of character, medium length brown hair, tall and slim but with the most incredible emerald green eyes that strongly reminded me of the beautiful sea off Cagliari in Sardinia. She was a divine human being indeed and her voice was magical, yet soothing, when I heard her ask the librarian about the availability of other books.
She then took her book on Proust out of her voluminous tan shoulder bag and also her Samsung tablet. For the next hour she read a dozen pages or so, and then made notes and occasionally smiled in my direction. Just as she was preparing to leave, another “visitor” entered the room for nature had decided to toss in a sunbeam which shone down momentarily onto her face. My heart skipped a beat at this and I quickly tossed my books into my bulging briefcase and followed her as she left the room.
Outside in the corridor, I looked at her questioningly and said:
“And how did you find this book Lynne?”
“How can I even attempt to describe this correspondence? It is exquisite Professor King. I’ve made so many notes that I’m rather at a loss to know what to describe. I also liked the way the book is broken down into three sections, accompanied by the copious notes so that by the final page, the quintessential character of Proust is revealed in all of its contradictory complexity, tied in with his ongoing illness. But really the staggering aspect of this book is that his father, Adrien, the distinguished physician, gave him access to a higher social class, the aristocrats and with his mother Jeanne’s Jewish ancestry thrown in as that extra genetic ingredient, the end result is this remarkable individual who still to this day fascinates the world with his enduring novels. In addition, the photographs in the book typify such a literary era, and the photo I particularly liked was Proust as a soldier aged eighteen. He was a “one year volunteer” and there is such an impish look on his face.”
“And how do you believe your thesis on Proust is going?”
“I believe very well, very well indeed but Professor King, surely that’s for you to decide? You are my supervisor after all…”
“Well we could discuss it further over dinner this evening you know. We have the tasters such as the secret messages concerning Ocsebib (the flamboyant Prince Antoine Bibesco) and Haras; Proust’s mimicry of Comte Robert de Montesquiou, the mesmerising Bertrand de Fénelon (the focus of Proust’s emotional life in 1902), Ruskin and so many other extraordinary individuals. Yes I do believe that we’ll have a successful lifetime collaboration together, and with Monsieur Proust being the catalyst in all of this, imagine what other adventures we can have together, for example, with travel and whatever else you decide to name.”
She then took her book on Proust out of her voluminous tan shoulder bag and also her Samsung tablet. For the next hour she read a dozen pages or so, and then made notes and occasionally smiled in my direction. Just as she was preparing to leave, another “visitor” entered the room for nature had decided to toss in a sunbeam which shone down momentarily onto her face. My heart skipped a beat at this and I quickly tossed my books into my bulging briefcase and followed her as she left the room.
Outside in the corridor, I looked at her questioningly and said:
“And how did you find this book Lynne?”
“How can I even attempt to describe this correspondence? It is exquisite Professor King. I’ve made so many notes that I’m rather at a loss to know what to describe. I also liked the way the book is broken down into three sections, accompanied by the copious notes so that by the final page, the quintessential character of Proust is revealed in all of its contradictory complexity, tied in with his ongoing illness. But really the staggering aspect of this book is that his father, Adrien, the distinguished physician, gave him access to a higher social class, the aristocrats and with his mother Jeanne’s Jewish ancestry thrown in as that extra genetic ingredient, the end result is this remarkable individual who still to this day fascinates the world with his enduring novels. In addition, the photographs in the book typify such a literary era, and the photo I particularly liked was Proust as a soldier aged eighteen. He was a “one year volunteer” and there is such an impish look on his face.”
“And how do you believe your thesis on Proust is going?”
“I believe very well, very well indeed but Professor King, surely that’s for you to decide? You are my supervisor after all…”
“Well we could discuss it further over dinner this evening you know. We have the tasters such as the secret messages concerning Ocsebib (the flamboyant Prince Antoine Bibesco) and Haras; Proust’s mimicry of Comte Robert de Montesquiou, the mesmerising Bertrand de Fénelon (the focus of Proust’s emotional life in 1902), Ruskin and so many other extraordinary individuals. Yes I do believe that we’ll have a successful lifetime collaboration together, and with Monsieur Proust being the catalyst in all of this, imagine what other adventures we can have together, for example, with travel and whatever else you decide to name.”
Displaying 1 of 1 review