On reading Marcel Proust
I
have for long nursed a dream: to read Marcel Proust. I knew he wrote in long,
winding sentences and while navigating those byzantine lanes and by-lanes, one
was prone to lose way. An atrociously slow reader that I am - averse to all
twists and puzzles whether mental or those inflicted by our digitalized
lifestyles - I always thought that Proust and ‘yours truly’ would never make good bedfellows. But I have a secret infatuation for French books, wines and women
of whom I can at least solicit the first (by just loosening my feeble purse
strings), and just fantasize about the other two! And then having read Victor
Hugo’s life-altering classic ‘Les Misérables’, and later Balzac’s (a
contemporary of Hugo and Alexander Dumas) heart-tugging biography ‘Jeevan Madira’
(‘Wine of Life’) reflecting his extraordinary writing genius standing in sharp
contrast to his flamboyant lifestyle and innumerable trysts with women, my
rendezvous with Proust was inevitable.
And
weeks back, at a bookstore, while browsing titles under the seductive spell of
books and trying to make my pick, when by sheer chance my greedy-eyed gaze fell
on ‘Swann in Love’, Proust happened!
Yes,
meandering it is. Long convoluted sentences make you lose the thread making you
stop a while, go to the beginning and start all over again. Gradually then, the
veil of ambiguity begins to recede fold by fold - like a beauteous, recalcitrant face succumbing to persistent implorings
of a lover! - and a balmy, sensuous, revealing light of understanding begins to
dawn on you and elevate you to the corridors of bliss. You smile as you savour
the flavour, the music and the song under the magic spell cast on you. It is as
if you have been wading through a long, unfamiliar tunnel full of apprehension
of the unknown, and have at the end of it found a beam of light shining on you.
‘Swann
in Love’ is the story of Swann- a wealthy, bohemian young man, a connoisseur of
art, literature and music, and moving in high circles of Parisian glitterati
where he has admiring friends and doting aristocratic women. Subsequently, he
bumps into another woman, Odette, who is neither rich, nor so refined in tastes;
also, not so bewitchingly beautiful; nor even a paragon of virtue- as he later discovers.
But love is love after all. Stung by Cupid’s arrow, Swann falls madly in love
with Odette and suddenly his view of her undergoes a sea change- her warts
becoming beauty spots, as it were! The book is all about Swann’s fears, hopes,
jealousies, fantasies and unreason battling with reason under the spell of love.
After initial love making, Odette, already known for cavorting with many men
and women, turns indifferent to him despite Swann’s generous gifts and money he
showers on her with gleeful generosity in the vain hope of winning her over,
and is eventually left pondering unable to make sense of it all.
Sample
this short one:
‘Ah, how easily kisses come, in the
first days of love! They spring up so close to each other, and it would be as
hard to count the kisses exchanged in an hour as the flowers in a field in May.”
Happy reading! Happy Diwali!
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It is good to know about Proust his interest n writings. Good luck.
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