Stephanie Jane reviewed Un amour de Swann by Marcel Proust
My Victorian and, probably, last Proust!
3 stars
I had never read any of Proust's work prior to picking up this new Pushkin Press translation of Swann In Love. Being familiar with his name though and seeing that this book is a standalone novella, I thought it would be a good chance to sample 'one of the world's best novelists'. I am glad to have taken the opportunity and I can certainly understand why Proust is so acclaimed, however I can also say that Swann In Love will probably be my first and last venture into this author's work and thank goodness I didn't act upon my first idea of trying to read anything in the original French!
That said, there is a lot I appreciated about Swann In Love. The character portrayals are superb and I felt Proust perfectly captured the rarified atmosphere and intense snobbery of the Verdurin's social set. Swann himself is an awful, self-serving …
I had never read any of Proust's work prior to picking up this new Pushkin Press translation of Swann In Love. Being familiar with his name though and seeing that this book is a standalone novella, I thought it would be a good chance to sample 'one of the world's best novelists'. I am glad to have taken the opportunity and I can certainly understand why Proust is so acclaimed, however I can also say that Swann In Love will probably be my first and last venture into this author's work and thank goodness I didn't act upon my first idea of trying to read anything in the original French!
That said, there is a lot I appreciated about Swann In Love. The character portrayals are superb and I felt Proust perfectly captured the rarified atmosphere and intense snobbery of the Verdurin's social set. Swann himself is an awful, self-serving and self-centered person with a tremendously overblown sense of his own importance. I recognised quite early on that his all consuming romance with courtesan Odette was a mostly one-sided affair, and I would love to read this same novella from Odette's perspective. Has that story been written? Her refusal to mould herself into the woman Swann wants her to be is refreshing and makes his frequent complaints about her lack of the 'correct' taste humorous rather than sinister. I was reminded of George du Maurier's Trilby for whom the opposite becomes true.
What made Swann In Love a slog for me to read though was its long-winded, verbose style which often saw my focus wandering. In this, the book is obviously very much of its time. The style might not be so off-putting to fans of Victorian (and thereabouts) era literature, but for me, having not read such an old novel for a while, it was a bit too hard going so I can't see myself going on to read the further works in the trilogy.