NONFICTION

In Search of Lost Time: Swann's Way

by Marcel Proust
Vol. 1. Yale Univ. Vol. 1. Nov. 2013. 512p. ed. by William C. Carter. illus. notes. bibliog. index. ISBN 9780300185430. $22. LIT
COPY ISBN
Eminent Proust (1871–1922) biographer and scholar Carter (Marcel Proust: A Life; Proust in Love) has attempted an unprecedented and laudable intellectual feat with his annotation of Swann's Way, the first volume in Proust's the seven-volume novel In Search of Lost Time. He seeks to clarify every term in the novel that might be unknown to the lay reader, allowing the complex inner world of Proust's epic to be tauntingly revealed, page by page. His academic courage is commendable, but not all is rosy in Swann's garden. Some of the notes seem unnecessary, others incomplete, and historical blurbs are often fleshed out with irrelevant information. His commentary on the themes is erratic, making them seem less significant than they actually are. And when pages go by without annotation, one wonders if he really sought to be exhaustively complete.
VERDICT Scholars of Proust may scoff at a lack of "defining details," but this work will prove a useful tool for those dipping their madeleine in for the first time.
Reviewed by Lara Jacobs, Brooklyn , Dec 06, 2013
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