Rating: 
Summary: A Small Treasure
Review: I admit that I have never read Proust. Having heard of the books collectively called "Remembrance of Things Past", I had also heard that they were quite long and involved. However, after reading this slim volume I believe I might pick up Proust's masterpiece. What struck me the most about this book is the ability of the author Botton to find those small snippets of prose which seem to speak the loudest. One of my favorite parts is the attack on hackneyed phrases used by authors to describe things like the "shimmering moon". Proust argues that by reducing complex thought to such a rote phrase, man looses to ability to see the true object and make his own observations. I have actually started to apply this to my own life. I try to look at objects I see everyday and think how I could describe this. I enjoyed the book and would recommend it to anyone with an interest in not only Proust but on the effect of literature on our lives.
Rating: 
Summary: Too Precious
Review: Mildly amusing for awhile, and certainly original, the book becomes tedious for its cuteness, its archness. Proust will not change my life or yours.
Rating: 
Summary: better than the subject
Review: Marcel Proust, like his fellow modernist icons, Kafka and Joyce, produced a literature which is entirely personal, devoid of the kind of universality which had, up until their time, characterized the Western Canon. If it is a coincidence, it is a revelatory one, that the key moment in Swann's Way, if not in all of In Search of Lost Time, comes with a perversion of the Communion. A bite of madeleine and a sip of tea sends Proust's narrator/Proust reeling back through the years, turns him entirely inwards, and inundates him with personal memories and feelings. During this reverie, Proust's older self essentially communes with his younger self, or selves. Here we have the individual, whole unto himself, needing only his own feelings and memories to find those things which give his life meaning. This stands thousands of years of the Judeo-Christian tradition on its head. It has been the dream of Western man, and a noble one, that we might rise beyond purely personal concerns and achieve something together as a species, achieve one day a kind of godhood ourselves. In no small part, it is this shared dream, and its requirement of communality, which has led us to create the liberal protestant capitalist democratic institutions which have made possible social progress over the past several centuries. Though these institutions vindicate individual rights, they are focussed on the ways in which men can co-exist and work together. Each in its own way is premised on the Golden Rule : Do unto others as you would have done unto you. Each of us, as individuals, will reap the benefit of the general adherence to this stricture, but it is primarily concerned with how we behave towards others. Similarly, during the Communion we turn not inwards but outwards, remembering the sacrifice that Christ made, taking our sinfulness upon himself, that we might approach closer to God. It is unsurprising then that the 20th Century, with Proust (and Darwin and Nietzsche and Freud and Marx and Joyce) leading the intellectual way, saw the near collapse of Judeo-Christian tradition and Western institutions and a descent into barbarism, as people acted out the ideas of the vanguard, with every man seeking only his own self interest. What is surprising is that so many chose to listen to the utter blather of such men. And none of those men, bizarre as they generally were, made a more unlikely prophet than Proust. A truly curious conceit animates the cult of Proust, the belief that the very characteristics which made Marcel Proust so completely aberrant, also made him uniquely perceptive about the human condition. Here's how de Botton puts it : The magnitude of Proust's misfortunes should not be allowed to cast doubt on the validity of his ideas. ... Though philosophers have traditionally been concerned with the pursuit of happiness, far greater wisdom would seem to lie in pursuing ways to be properly and productively unhappy. The stubborn recurrence of misery means that the development of a workable approach to it must surely outstrip the value of any utopian quest for happiness. Proust, a veteran of grief, knew as much. Meanwhile, here's as good a one sentence description of Proust as I could find : A mother's boy who never really grew up, a part-genuine, part-imaginary invalid totally incapable of looking after himself, a reluctant homosexual who may never have known genuine fulfillment, he spent his early manhood in Parisian high society and then retired, hermit-like, to his famous cork-lined room, where he turned day into night and night into day. -John Weightman, Books Unlimited review of How Proust Can Change Your Life Okay, so that would make him a gay, hypochondriacal, mama-loving, French, recluse. And it necessarily raises the question : what does someone who was little more than a bundle of neuroses--someone who seemingly incorporated most of the pathologies of a 20th Century which we generally consider to have been a blood soaked disaster--have to tell us about life in general ? Alain de Botton believes Proust has quite a bit to tell us, and he tries mightily to make Proust seem pertinent to our lives. In effect, de Botton reads In Search of Lost Time as a huge self help manual. This is often very funny, and is presumably intended to be ironic, but is ultimately unconvincing. The many stories he tells about Proust and about contemporary reaction to his writing are quite amusing, but he can never quite get us convincingly past that first big hurdle : Proust was simply too screwed up for us to accept that he has much to say to us. Having successfully turned inward himself, he found nothing but himself, and an unpleasant self at that. The resulting fiction is necessarily idiosyncratic and personal, rather than universal. In the end, all Proust really had to say was what it was like to be Proust, which does not seem to have been a particularly enjoyable experience. Combine that with the fact that he said it in the most stultifyingly boring fashion and at interminable length and there's just no compelling reason to read him. Each chapter of de Botton's book is based on something he maintains Proust can teach us, and the final chapter is called "How to Put Books Down." One has to assume that this is intentionally humorous on de Botton's part, because there may be no other author who has forced as many readers to put his book's down as Proust. They are truly unreadable, as the comments of even his friends and family acknowledge. If, like me, you feel some obligation to at least familiarize yourself with Proust's work, do yourself a huge favor and read How Proust Can Change Your Life instead of the original novels. Despite its ostensible intent, it will cure you of any desire to pick up a Proustian tome in the first place. GRADE : B+
Rating:
Summary: A witty combination
Review: I can see where this book might rub some people the wrong way. People with an old fashioned dedication to literature probably won't appreciate Alain de Botton's clever re-contextualizing of Proust within the modern genre of self-help. I might feel similarly if de Botton claimed to be writing a real self-help book or a serious examination of Proust, but he never attempts to perform either feat. Instead, de Botton accomplishes several things. He parodies self-help books, he undertakes a humorous and highly personal exploration of Proust, and he makes a witty argument about how literature can aid us in our daily lives. The heart of de Botton's message is actually paradoxical. From one perspective he is saying, "don't take literature too seriously" and from another he is saying, "literature is a critical tool in everyone's life". I believe that all of us essentially reinvent what we read and use it to interpret our lives and the world around us. De Botton simply provides a humorous and intelligent blue print of this natural process.
Rating: 
Summary: Interesting Hybrid
Review: I came to read this via de Botton's fictional work (Kiss and Tell, On Love, The Romantic Movement), which I loved. Proust was a name I certainly knew, but the notion of sitting down and reading his seven volume Remembrance of Things Past was (and is) rather distasteful. Here, de Botton has applied his imagination and deft, witty prose to using the Frenchman's mammoth novel as a sort of self-help guide cum literary biography. It's a strange mix, and the pleasure comes in seeing how de Botton pulls it off, rather than the actual "lessons" drawn from Proust, which are rather obvious pieces of common sense (at least to me). It's worth a quick glance--if for no other reason than to see a very unusual hybrid of a book--and it's very short in any event.
Rating:
Summary: Self-help at its best!
Review: Alain de Botton knows how to delve into subjects that really matter. He is a genius who certainly knows what he's talking about. There are self-help books that aren't, well, very helpful. How Proust Can Change Your Life isn't one of them. Step by step, de Botton guides the reader into the realm of self-improvement. There are chapters like "How to Suffer Successfully" -- a chapter that, despite its ironic title, helps deal with personal problems and unexpected circumstances. Also, there is a short autobiographical portrait of Marcel Proust -- the author that influenced this book. I cannot fully attribute the incredible work of this book to Proust, but it is evident that he had something to do with it. One thing is certain though: Alain de Botton is a genius! I highly recommend this book!
Rating: 
Summary: A Disappointment: No Mention of Prust in AK
Review: Me and Doris liked this horrible and severe text - but it totally omitted all notion of Proust's hard work in the bush leagues with Alaska's minor leage baseball "Fightin' Eskimos" before he went on to join the Parisian avant guarde of the early 20th C. If you want I can show you a picture of Proust at one of the early Idederod races, but this book is a waste of time if like me your key interest in doctoral studies is Proustian-Alaska biological lies. DO NOT USE THIS TEXT FOR THAT KIND OF RESEARCH!
Rating:
Summary: Philosophy- made practical!
Review: Alain de Botton has done what many may believe to be impossible-- he has found a lucrative use for philosophy. Okay, maybe he isn't the first one, but he certainly has done a good job of it. His style of prose is addictive-- de Botton is witty and light while still maintaining a level of profundity and intellect. The book certainly does not read like an academic monologue, but one comes away from it with something of the feeling of having partaken in something intellectual and educational. In addition, the pictures and drawings that pepper the pages will often make you smile. I came to it without previous knowledge of Proust; nevertheless I was able to appreciate it quite a bit. (At times I longed for footnotes so that I could pursue a deeper study of Proust, but it isn't that sort of book). Beginning with "How to love life today" and ending with "How to put books down," de Botton does an excellent job of relating the work of Proust to our everyday lives. De Botton has an instinct for understanding human behavior and enjoys deconstructing it with the tools of philosophy. Read it and enjoy; reflect on the content, and it might well do some good.
Rating:
Summary: FUN
Review: Being one of those people who worships REMEMBRANCE OF THINGS PAST, I received this as a gift from a friend. I approached it with scepticism for I had never thought of Proust as a how-to author, but he works surprisingly well as that! This little book is fun, funny, and often touching.
Rating:
Summary: McProust
Review: This "not a novel" can be advertised as a self-help book to the same extent that McDonalds can be advertised as a health-food store. You are left wondering in either case if it is just a joke that you did not get. Botton's attempt to compartmentalize Proust into a Happy Meal is certain to offend any thoughtful reader, whether he has ever read a word of Proust or not. Proust's life and his novel are worth learning about, even though it is debatable whether Proust's novel itself is worth reading. Those who have the misfortune of finding themselves trying to understand Botton's impenetrable writing might find a return to Proust easy going. Just to show us he is a regular guy, he even includes a picture of his girlfriend in his book. Issues, indeed! When others purport to explain art to you so that you can understand it, beware. If you want self-help, go read Proust himself or a diet book, or better yet, Walker Percy.
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