'Proust teaches us to pay attention'

Marcel Proust symbolizes European culture. His work revolves around the process of remembering: What do we remember, when do we remember, how do we remember? How do memories change? In his main work, A la Recherche du Temps Perdu (In Search of Lost Time) — seven volumes with a total of more than 4,000 pages — the author approaches memory by means of a fictional autobiography.

Unreadable?

A French national treasure by now, the work has become a synonym for "bulky reading," says Ulrike Sprenger, professor of Romance Literatures and General Literary Studies at Germany's University of Konstanz and the author of Proust ABC, a book first published in 1997 that has been added to and reprinted in the meantime.

Anyone who reads Proust is worthy of praise among the educated middle classes; at the same time, Proust's work is regarded as literature that is almost impossible to master.

A 1972 sketch by Britain's Monty Python titled "The All-England Summarize Proust Competition" says it all: Contestants were asked to summarize In Search of lost Time in 15 seconds. An impossible task; in the end, the prize goes to "the girl with the biggest tits."

Epic with a message

Is Proust the epitome of unintelligible reading? Ulrike Sprenger told DW she recently read a comment on the coronavirus lockdown in the Guardian: "They can lock me down, but they can't make me read Proust."

Proust never wanted to be stylized as a monument, she added. He wanted to create a guideline to discovering one's own life, to see how memory works, how to think about yourself."

Marcel Proust was born in Paris in 1871 to Adrien Proust, a doctor and hygienist, and Jeanne Weil, a young woman from a Jewish banking family.

Paris faced turbulent times in the wake of the 1870/71 Franco-Prussian War and the creation of a revolutionary city council. Young Marcel was a sickly child, suffering his first severe asthma attack at the age of nine.

As a young adult, Proust entered Parisian society by visiting readings, discussions, and music in the so-called salons, exclusive meeting places for well-to-do and aristocratic citizens in the 19th century.

In his main work, Proust makes observations on the atmosphere and the network of relationships in the salons.

In Search of lost Time is outstanding in that it consistently stages human subjectivity.

In 1919, the second volume was awarded the Prix Goncourt, France's highest literary award. Proust shows that no human being can lay claim to the truth, since truth is its own construction and as such is always subjective. On the other hand, this unique subjective perception is mankind's treasure. Over many pages and in convoluted sentences, he eloquently demonstrates this.

Who's afraid of Marcel Proust?

Proust's work still fascinates today. In 1998, Alain de Botton, a British-Swiss writer and philosopher, wrote How Proust Can Change Your Life. In 2020, Israeli historian Saul Friedländer focused on Proust's In Search of lost Time in an essay entitled Reading Proust.

Linguists and literary scholars research the 19th-century novelist's works. Lothar Müller, a German journalist, this year published Adrien Proust and his Son Marcel, comparing the literary world and the realm of medicine. Proust translator Bernd-Jürgen Fischer explores the writer's family and circle of friends in the 2020 In Search of Marcel Proust. Previously unknown texts by Proust have also been recently published.

Proust 'teaches us to look closely'

Proust fans can visit Marcel Proust's reconstructed bedroom at the Musee Carnavalet in Paris — a narrow metal-framed bed in a darkened room where Proust spent the last years of his life and wrote large parts of La Recherche.

Ulrike Sprenger thinks every single page of Proust is worthwhile.

"Proust teaches us to look, to understand what is important to us, to pay attention to the little things that mean something to you," she said.

This article was translated from German.