My Years With Proust - Day 734

   This notion of Time embodied, of years past but not separated from us, it was now my intention to emphasise as strongly as possible in my work.  And at this very moment, in the house of the Prince de Guermantes, as though to strengthen me in my resolve, the noise of my parents' footsteps as they accompanied M. Swann to the door and the peal - resilient, ferruginous, interminable, fresh and shrill - of the bell on the garden gate which informed me that at last he had gone and that Mamma would presently come upstairs, these sounds rang again in my ears, yes, unmistakably I heard these very sounds, situated though they were in a remote past.  And as I cast my mind over all the events which were ranged in an unbroken series between the moment of my childhood when I had first heard its sound and the Guermantes party, I was terrified to think that it was indeed this same bell which rang within me and that nothing that I could do would alter its jangling notes.

Marcel Proust, Time Regained, p. 1105

Proust has his own style, obviously.  And who else has Proust's style? When I read John Irving or Rohinton Mistry or J.K. Rowling I always hearken back to Dickens (as much as everybody tries to tie Rowling to Tolkien I think Dickens is the better fit).  I guess this popped into my head when I read this because it initially sounded very Dickensian.  But again, who has Proust's style?  Sometimes you'll hear books described as having a somewhat Proustian scope or attention to detail or level of psychological exploration, but I don't know if I can think of anyone whose writing style itself was compared to Proust's. Anyway, I guess I thought of Dickens because of the use of the word ferruginous, which just seems appropriately Dickensian [note to self: use the word ferruginous more in polite company].

In this passage Proust is once again taking us back to the first pages of the novel and those earliest childhood memories.  I joked earlier that I was not going to follow the example of Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer and immediately reread Remembrance of Things Past after finishing it, but I'm now rethinking that decision.  I promised that I would hold off because I have so many other projects I need to tackle, but whenever Proust includes one of these references to his childhood, and the earliest sections of the book, I feel that I missed so much and need to go back.  Obviously, there are worlds within worlds in this novel.  It would also be nice to go back freed of the need to write notes to myself throughout the entire novel, and just immerse myself in it for the joy of reading (not that it wasn't lovely the first time through).  That said, of course I'd end up writing all over it again and I reconsidered things.  Oh, and speaking of Breyer, I feel that as a culture celebrate idiocy - and our president is an unlettered moron - the age in which public officials were actually undeniable literate scholars is coming to an end.  I feel so much of my career has been a long fight against the dying of the intellectual light (hence we read the epics in my class while my much cooler colleagues read graphic novels) but retreating into the house I'm thinking of buying in Zanzibar and simply reading and writing sounds better with each passing day.