A LA Recherche Du Temps Perdu

Rating:
Summary: If you want to know time.
Review: I have always been interested in time; whatever that is.
My first attempt(circa 1964) to understand time consisted of reading some very elementary texts on Einstein's theory of relativity. As I was romping through Einstein, a good friend introduced me to Proust's monumental work: A la recherche du temps perdu. I read and read and read and soon came to the conclusion that Proust had captured the very essence of psychological time. And the prose; so beautiful. Since that long ago time, I have read the thoughts of so many others on time: Faulkner, Mann, Kant, Wittgenstein, Heidegger, Levinas, and most recently Hawking. The conclusion that I have come to is that if you really want to know TIME, then buy an inexpensive copy of Proust's great work and read, read, and read. Remember, you will ceratinly need much time. To the couple in Northern Germany; I resided in Bad Kreuznach, Germany for 8 months and it always made me think of Proust. I would welcome a comment from Northern Germany. Mead Whorton in The U.S.A.

Rating:
Summary: The one-and-only book
Review: I own the book. I read only ~25 % yet. But I can only highly recommend reading the "Lost Time". I own the book since nearly 2 years. Me and my wife have had so much fun in reading it. We are just about page # 1089. Wonder why ? We really READ it LISTENING to each other, in about 15-20 sides - portions. It is so interesting to speak the words, to listen to the long winding phrases Proust uses. This really gets you behind the scenes of understanding the style of writing Proust used (after reading 1000 sides, we can not rarely imagine Proust reviding (!) his text so often when reading the corrections from the printing company ! His last years on earth have been a sleeping-and-correcting-rallye...). Besides the lecture we have read some biographies about Proust, his work and his time. But we have found out that reading the text IS reading about the time and about Proust/the way he was. Looking forward to end the lecture in about five years we can only wish everyone who has the power (or the speed) to (lets call it) "dive" into the proustian ocean for about 4000 sides A LOT OF FUN WITH PROUST (and a willing housewife who likes baking madeleines...). (For the I-can't-believe folks of you: This is no joke. We really read the book the way I told above !!!)

We don't think anybody will read this. We have given a non existing e-mail-adress to amazon, because we also want no answer. -(to amazon: Please, publish it disregarding my wrong e-mail-adress. But I wouldn't be here and write, if I was not interested in your company, so please let me write about the excitement I felt to read the one and only book I really admire)-

BUT: If there is really anyone else in the world who understands how we (my wife and me) think about Prousts work, and if there is anybody who is interested in sharing his opinion with us, he is invited to give a review the way we did. So we can communicate that way.

Well, lets look deeply into a cup of tea and think of MARCEL PROUST, who is well remembered throughout his immortal lifetime-masterpiece of world literature. We hope he has found his lost time (we will see at approx. side # 4000...)

Review written on March 17th, 2001. A Proust-fanatic of northern Germany.

Rating:
Summary: The Most Incredible Novel Ever Written!!!
Review: Proust writes like Mozart composes; every sentence, every word is pure magic.

Don't let the length (almost 4,000 pages) scare you away; it's well worth it. I read it for a class in college and then re-read it in one summer after I graduated on my subway commute to work and during my one-hour lunch; many times I became so caught up in the "action" that I lost track of time (and was, therefore, late getting back to the office).

I'm usually a "translation snob" but the Montcrief translation is wonderful (if you don't know French).