Marcel Proust

Swann's Way Marcel Proust

Publisher Marketing: For a long time I used to go to bed early. Sometimes, when I had put out my candle, my eyes would close so quickly that I had not even time to say "I'm going to sleep." And half an hour later the thought that it was time to go to sleep would awaken me; I would try to put away the book which, I imagined, was still in my hands, and to blow out the light; I had been thinking all the time, while I was asleep, of what I had just been reading, but my thoughts had run into a channel of their own, until I myself seemed actually to have become the subject of my book: a church, a quartet, the rivalry between Francois I and Charles V. This impression would persist for some moments after I was awake; it did not disturb my mind, but it lay like scales upon my eyes and prevented them from registering the fact that the candle was no longer burning. Then it would begin to seem unintelligible, as the thoughts of a former existence must be to a reincarnate spirit; the subject of my book would separate itself from me, leaving me free to choose whether I would form part of it or no; and at the same time my sight would return and I would be astonished to find myself in a state of darkness, pleasant and restful enough for the eyes, and even more, perhaps, for my mind, to which it appeared incomprehensible, without a cause, a matter dark indeed. I would ask myself what o'clock it could be; I could hear the whistling of trains, which, now nearer and now farther off, punctuating the distance like the note of a bird in a forest, shewed me in perspective the deserted countryside through which a traveller would be hurrying towards the nearest station: the path that he followed being fixed for ever in his memory by the general excitement due to being in a strange place, to doing unusual things, to the last words of conversation, to farewells exchanged beneath an unfamiliar lamp which echoed still in his ears amid the silence of the night; and to the delightful prospect of being once again at home. Review Citations: New York Review of Books 12/01/2005 pg. 62 (EAN 9780141180588, Mass Market Paperbound) Entertainment Weekly 07/05/2013 pg. 102 (EAN 9781847027696, Paperback) New York Times 12/05/2004 pg. 83 (EAN 9780142437964, Paperback) Library Journal Prepub Alert 05/15/2003 pg. 68 (EAN 9780670032457, Hardcover) Publishers Weekly 07/14/2003 pg. 53 (EAN 9780670032457, Hardcover) - *Starred Review Library Journal 09/01/2003 pg. 211 (EAN 9780670032457, Hardcover) - *Starred Review Atlantic Monthly 01/01/2004 pg. 171 (EAN 9780670032457, Hardcover) New York Times 01/25/2004 pg. 11 (EAN 9780670032457, Hardcover) Library Journal 05/15/2003 (EAN 9780670032457, Hardcover) Library Journal 08/01/2003 (EAN 9780670032457, Hardcover) Wilson Fiction Catalog 01/01/1995 pg. 535 (EAN 9780679600053, Hardcover) Wilson Fiction Catalog 01/01/2000 pg. 546 (EAN 9780679600053, Hardcover) Wilson Fiction Catalog 01/01/2006 pg. 775 (EAN 9780679600053, Hardcover) Wilson Fiction Catalog 01/01/2010 pg. 747 (EAN 9780679600053, Hardcover) Ingram Advance 06/01/1999 pg. 102 (EAN 9780140283266, Paperback) Choice 10/01/2014 pg. 262 (EAN 9780300185430, Paperback) People Weekly 12/23/2013 pg. 57 (EAN 9780143124696, Hardcover) Library Journal 05/01/2012 pg. 45 (EAN 9781843796060, Compact Disc) Library Journal 03/01/2011 pg. 46 (EAN 9781400146154, Compact Disc) Contributor Bio:  Proust, Marcel Marcel Proust (1871 1922) was a French novelist, essayist, and critic, most famous for his autobiographical series of novels, In Search of Lost Time.