Advertisement
If you have a new account but are having problems posting or verifying your account, please email us on hello@boards.ie for help. Thanks :)
Hello all! Please ensure that you are posting a new thread or question in the appropriate forum. The Feedback forum is overwhelmed with questions that are having to be moved elsewhere. If you need help to verify your account contact hello@boards.ie

Any Proust fans?

Options
  • 18-01-2010 11:23pm
    #1
    ally2
    Closed Accounts Posts: 51 ✭✭


    I am tackling In Search of Lost Time and am wondering if anyone has read all five volumes? I read bits of it when younger but recently never all of them and am thinking this will take me a lifetime...well a few years anyway.

    Anyone read them all and how long did it take?


Comments

  • Options
    #2
    buck65
    Closed Accounts Posts: 4,969 ✭✭✭buck65


    I haven't read them yet but someday...
    My interest was piqued by Fintan O Toole who at a seminar described reading the books while being away in China for a few months. He rates them as one of his favourite reads. I read some of the first one online to get a feel for it and tbh it reads quite easily.
    Keep us posted on how you get on.
    Ps where did you buy the books , are they in one set or did you buy individually?


  • Options
    #3
    Eliot Rosewater
    Registered Users Posts: 3,745 ✭✭✭Eliot Rosewater


    I dont know much about Proust. Anyone want to give the "low down" on him? What he about? etc...

    I was looking over on Book Depo and there seems to be a number of translations floating around, including a "new" one by Penguin.


  • Options
    #4
    ally2
    Closed Accounts Posts: 51 ✭✭ally2


    I have the translated volumes by Scott Moncrieff with revisions. I heard there was a new translation after I bought them.

    The whole novel has nearly 1.5 million words! I think some people who want to read it just read the most important volumes and read criticism and reviews on the less readable parts. Am starting with Swanns way tomorrow so will see how I get on.

    Did Fintan O'Toole say he read the whole thing in a few months??


  • Options
    #5
    mackthefinger
    Registered Users Posts: 116 ✭✭mackthefinger


    I started it a few years ago, and got about halfway
    through the first volume. I think my version was
    a penguin classic, though I can't remember who the
    translator was, which I'm sure is very important.I found it very
    time consuming, but satisfying. Some of the sentences
    seem to last for pages, but its just the effect of the writing.
    He can go into an incredible amount of detail over the slightest
    little thing (the crumbs of cake is the most famous example)
    can set him off on memories and sensations....I found
    I had to read it slightly differently, to get the benefit. Definitely
    to be savoured. I did think it was easier to read than Ulysses, but
    maybe that's just me.

    I'd forgotten I had a copy...will dig it out, maybe give it another go.
    I think Alain de Botton has a book called 'How proust can
    save your life' as well. Be an interesting exercise for a reading
    group if you had years on your hands.


  • Options
    #6
    ally2
    Closed Accounts Posts: 51 ✭✭ally2


    I think Alain de Botton has a book called 'How proust can
    save your life' as well. Be an interesting exercise for a reading
    group if you had years on your hands.

    I heard about that de Botton book, might be a good way to cheat if I get stuck after a volume or two!


  • Advertisement
Advertisement