Very Short Introductions Marcel Proust: A Very Short Introduction, (Paperback)

100 years after Proust's death, <em>In Search of Lost Time</em> remains one of the greatest works in World Literature. At 3,000 pages, it can be intimidating to some. This short volume invites first-time readers and veterans alike to view the novel in a new way. <p>Marcel Proust (1871-1922) was arguably France's best-known literary writer. He was the author of stories, essays, translations, and a 3,000-page novel, <em> In Search of Lost Time</em> (1913-27). </p><p>This book is a brief guide to Proust's magnum opus in which Joshua Landy invites the reader to view the novel as a single quest--a quest for purpose, enchantment, identity, connection, and belonging--through the novel's fascinating treatments of memory, society, art, same-sex desire, knowledge, self-understanding, self-fashioning, and the unconscious mind. </p><p>Landy also shows why the questions Proust raises are important and exciting for all of us: how we can feel at home in the world; how we can find genuine connection with other human beings; how we can find enchantment in a world without God; how art can transform our lives; whether an artist's life can shed light on their work; what we can know about the world, other people, and ourselves; when not knowing is better than knowing; how sexual orientation affects questions of connection and identity; who we are, deep down; what memory tells us about our inner world; why it might be good to think of our life as a story; how we can feel like a single, unified person when we are torn apart by change and competing desires. Finally, Landy suggests why it's worthwhile to read the novel itself-how the long, difficult, but joyous experience of making it through 3,000 pages of prose can be transformative for our minds and souls.</p>

• Very Short Introductions Marcel Proust: A Very Short Introduction, (Paperback)
• Author: Andrew B Hammond Professor of French and Professor of Comparative Literature Joshua Landy
• ISBN: 9780197586556
• Format: Paperback
• Publication Date: 2024-12-18
• Page Count: 168