Combray, Proust

This weeks assigned reading is Proust's Swann's Way, specifically "Combray", a 1913 novel originally written in French. I initially had trouble getting into this book. I started off reading the introduction and writing notes about it, but I quickly realized I could not get into the book if I was sitting here thinking about the background. I had to just immerse myself into the words. Remembering throughout the reading that I would later be obliged to write a 400-500 word post about my thoughts made it difficult to enjoy the reading because I was just thinking about what I could possibly write about. In fact, while I was reading, I even jotted down this note "difficult to read and forget about the homework assigned," which has later prompted me to write this section. After this initial realization I tried to refrain from stopping reading and jotting down notes, and while I failed a few times, this did help me to actually get through the reading.

One other thing I found difficult with this book is trying to keep track of all the characters. I would be reading and come across a character, and then have to go back to when the character was introduced and reread their introduction to remember who they were. I found the introduction of all of the characters to be very quick and jarring, which made reading on confusing. While this introduction of characters helped move the story along, readers learned about them all relatively quickly, and there is a large amount of them to keep track of. My confusion might have been further fueled by the style of writing complexity of dialogue. While I was originally looking forward to challenging myself with a more difficult reading than I would normally gravitate to, I did not enjoy having to really think about the words, and even rereading sentences. 

My favourite part of the reading was when I felt I could empathize with the characters the most. This moment happened when the narrator was describing the bedtime ritual he had with his mom. I was prompted to reminisce about my childhood, sitting with my parents and always reading books with them before bedtime. I remembered that I had times where I would refuse, or was unable to go to sleep without this routine being fulfilled. In this way, I empathize with the narrator when he requires his mothers presence to fall asleep. 

My question for this week is: What part of the reading could you most connect to your life or other readings the most?

Comments

  1. Daniel Orizaga16 January 2024 at 20:30

    Samantha, how important did you find rituals in this narrative? As you say, there are some that are very obvious and others that seem to have a merely private nature for the narrator of this story. What does this make us think about ourselves? Is it common for us to communicate our private rituals to others?

    ReplyDelete
  2. Glen16 January 2024 at 21:47

    I definitely relate with the challenge of keeping track of all the characters, the writing was very complex! Did you find that this took away from the overall narrative?

    ReplyDelete
  3. Prathyush S17 January 2024 at 16:26

    I, too, had a similar experience with the complexity of the dialogue and how it influenced my reading experience. Do you think that changing this would improve the text, or does the complexity of the writing add to the overall text and the idea it is trying to present?

    ReplyDelete

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