Proust's Way: A Field Guide to in Search of Lost Time - Hardcover

Shattuck, Roger

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0393049140 ISBN 13: 9780393049145

Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company, 2000

Synopsis

An illuminating work that serves as both an introduction to Proust--perhaps Europe's most enduring twentieth-century novelist--and a searching reinterpretation of his work. Since beginning his career, Roger Shattuck has been mesmerized by one writer. First came Proust's Binoculars, a short, brilliant study published in 1964. Then came Marcel Proust, commissioned by Frank Kermode for the Modern Masters series, which won the National Book Award in 1974. A series of essays, lectures, and reviews followed. Now, like Richard Ellmann, whose constant outpourings on Joyce resulted in his triumphant biography James Joyce, Roger Shattuck written a new and definitive work. Devoting special care to Proust's masterpiece In Search of Lost Time (traditionally translated as Remembrance of Things Past), Shattuck laments his subject's defenselessness against zealous editors, praises some translations, examines Proust's place in the path of aesthetic decadence blazed by Baudelaire and Wilde, and presents Proust as a novelist whose philosophical gifts were matched by his irrepressible comic sense. Proust's Way, the culmination of a lifetime of scholarship, will serve as the next generation's guide to Proust.

About this title

About the Author

Roger Shattuck, author of Forbidden Knowledge and Proust's Way, has won the National Book Award. He lives in Vermont.

Reviews

Cobbling together commentary, instruction and practical advice, this grab-bag of a guide attempts to fill a gap in the vast library of Proust literature, with mixed results. Eminent scholar Shattuck (author of Proust's Binoculars and the National Book Award-winning Marcel Proust) eschews the personal approach favored by Alain de Botton and Phyllis Rose in their popular memoir-appreciations, but he does not limit himself to scholarly analysis, either, producing instead a kind of sophisticated Cliff Notes. The guide begins with a helpful overview of the novel and a chapter answering basic questions: in what language should one read Proust? (In French, if at all possible.) Is it absolutely necessary to read all 3,000 pages? (It is not--and Shattuck supplies an abridged reading plan in a footnote.) Moving on to a discussion of narrative strategies and themes, Shattuck urges an appreciation of Proust's often-overlooked comic sensibility and examines the author's more familiar preoccupations like time, memory and art. Most enlightening is his complex explication of the double "I" Proust employs: the gap between young Marcel and his older incarnation, the Narrator, creates what Shattuck terms a "stereopticon effect," by means of which the novel springs to four-dimensional life. A fascinating if polemical second-to-last chapter weighs in on ongoing debates in the world of Proust scholarship, judges the various French and English editions of the novel and examines its film versions. Although much of the guide is genuinely illuminating, the best material will be familiar to readers of Shattuck's previous works (he acknowledges his borrowings in his introduction), and some of the new sections--particularly an experimental "Coda," a fictional radio interview with a Proust scholar--strain for effect. (May)
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.

If you have ever wanted to tackle Proust's In Search of Lost Time but find it a bit daunting, this field guide will bejust the right thing. Shattuck, who won a National Book Award in 1974 for Marcel Proust, focuses here on Proust's place in 20th-century literature. He then provides a guide through Proust's masterpiece. He explains the major settings of the work, summarizes character and plot, and discusses central themes. Shattuck acknowledges that there is no one right interpretation of In Search of Lost Time but succeeds in providing a framework to help readers get through it. He addresses readers coming to the work for the first time, although those familiar with the work who are still struggling with its various facets will appreciate Shattuck's insights. Shattuck is most helpful in placing Proust and the work in the context of his time, giving a balanced treatment to the novel as a whole. Written in a style that will appeal to both the scholar and the lay reader, Shattuck's field guide should be a standard for years to come.DRon Ratliff, Emporia P.L., KS
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Edition details

• Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company
• Publication date: 2000
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0393049140
• ISBN 13: 9780393049145
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 288