Proust conceived “Finding Time Again” as a response to “In Search of Lost Time”.
Translated from French.
Proust conceived “Finding Time Again” as a response to “In Search of Lost Time”. When he was looking for a publisher 🕵🏻♂️ in 1912, he warned that the conclusion of the first volume (a sort of nostalgic reflection on times gone by 🕰️ and a bygone era that seems better simply because it is distant) is the opposite of the conclusion he wishes to reach in the second volume.
In 1913, he divided the manuscript of “In Search of Lost Time” into ✌🏻 parts: “Swann's Way” was published at the author’s expense on 14 November by Grasset, who announced the publication of “The Guermantes Way” for 1914. But the outbreak of the war had other plans. Publication of the Search did not resume until 1919 with the release of “In the Shadow of Young Girls in Flower”, which won the Prix Goncourt on 10 December. 🥇
Although Proust’s novel unfolds ‘from within’ and through offshoots (the Albertine cycle, in particular, but also the analysis of ‘men-women’ through the character of Charlus), the beginning and the end were established very early on, like the two pillars supporting the arch of this cathedral-like work. 🙌🏻💒
In “Matinée chez la Princesse de Guermantes”, Henri Bonnet establishes the standard edition of “Finding Time Again”, comprising two successive episodes: “L’adoration perpétuelle” and “Le Bal de Têtes”. The story is set in the post-war period 💣, but Proust’s conception of time and literature as set out in the work had been developed almost 20 years before its (posthumous) publication in 1927. 🗓️
In the first episode, the narrator experiences a series of epiphanies, which urge him to set to work ✍🏻 to rediscover the very essence of his life, free from the constraints of Time. In the second episode, he finds himself back in the morning and discovers, to his dismay, that everyone he has ever known has aged terribly 👴🏻👵🏻. Writing this work is therefore not only a necessity, but a matter of urgency. 🚨
N.B.: This edition dates from 1982 and is, as such, a sort of little Proustian ‘treasure’. 🏴☠️🧳
Comments 9
Comments translated automatically.
On Instagram