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Swann's Way
Swann's Way | Marcel Proust
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Vansa
Swann's Way | Marcel Proust
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Proust always sounds so regretful. I can't tell why he looks on the past with so much sadness for time past. Surely these are happy memories?

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Taylor
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Pickpick

This was great the first time around, much better the second.

I love Proust and his cool sentences, as well as his observations. This is the type of thing you have to read slow to absorb it, and understand the full depth of the ideas he‘s conveying. It‘s definitely not something to just run through so as to be able to say you read it.

Basically, the text gives back what you put into it. This is usually the case but even more so for Proust imo.

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Vansa
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This is an incredible description of what it feels like when clouds are chased away

shadows This novel is full of incredible description ( excuse me, my English language is not good)...I have read twice 10mo
Vansa English isn't my first language either!😀All good. Wow, you've read twice,that is amazing!Very beautiful descriptions.My first time,have not started the second volume yet! 10mo
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Vansa
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This is beautiful, evocative writing. I've said it before but it bears repeating - Proust might go on a bit at times( a lot, actually) but there are passages of such beauty, and so vividly described, that it is definitely worth reading

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Taylor

I had no greater desire than to see a storm at sea, not so much because it would be a beautiful spectacle as because it would be a moment of nature‘s real life unveiled; or rather for me there were no beautiful spectacles except the ones which I knew were not artificially contrived for my pleasure, but were necessary, unchangeable—the beauties of landscapes or of great art.

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bunneeboy
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Pickpick

Makes ya think, don‘t it?…

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Taylor

one thing love and death have in common, more than those vague resemblances people are always talking about, is that they make us question more deeply, for fear that its reality will slip away from us, the mystery of personality.

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merelybookish
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"The places we have known do not belong solely to the world of space in which we situate them for our greater convenience . . . The memory of a certain image is only regret for a certain moment; and houses, roads, avenues are as fleeting, alas, as the years."
Thus ends Volume 1. I am in love. ?

Cathythoughts Beautiful 13mo
LeahBergen That‘s a great cover! 13mo
BarbaraBB Volume I is so good. Will you continue right away? 13mo
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merelybookish @BarbaraBB That's the plan. I read a bit in the morning with my coffee. It's a nice little routine. 13mo
merelybookish @LeahBergen @Cathythoughts All the volumes in the series have great covers! 13mo
BarbaraBB Sounds perfect! 13mo
53 likes6 comments
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Taylor

Even before seeing Odette there, even if he did not manage to see her, what happiness it would give him to step on that earth where, not knowing the exact location, at any given moment, of her presence, he would feel palpitating everywhere the possibility of her sudden appearance….

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merelybookish
Swann's Way | Marcel Proust
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Zipporah, Jethro's's daughter -- a small detail from Botticelli's "The Trials of Moses."
I looked up this painting (like many Proust readers before me) because Swann believes Odette resembles this portrait, which helps him fall in love with her.
(It would seem that is not a great reason to fall in love with someone, or might not lead to lasting happiness.)
I'm about halfway through Volume 1. Still enjoying my #morningswithMarcel

JenniferP There‘s a fabulous book with glossy photos of all the paintings mentioned in Proust. It was a great companion book when I read Proust a few years ago. 13mo
merelybookish @JenniferP Thanks for the tip! Didn't realize reading Proust would be such an investment. 💸🙃 13mo
50 likes2 comments
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Vansa
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This is such lovely writing

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Vansa
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That's quite lovely

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merelybookish
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And so it begins....mornings sith Marcel.

JenniferP I read this over a year several years back and absolutely loved it. One of my best reading experiences, despite getting lost sometimes and bored sometimes. Enjoy! 14mo
Vansa I'm reading this series too! 15 minutes every day! 14mo
sarahbarnes 🥳🥳🥳 14mo
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TheLudicReader Brave! 14mo
merelybookish @JenniferP That's encouraging to hear, and relatable. 🙂 Im hoping to read the entire series this year but will see. I read a bit each morning with my coffee and am enjoying so far! 14mo
merelybookish @Vansa Nice! I'll be sure to check in on your progress. How far are you? 14mo
merelybookish @sarahbarnes Invitation is still open to join! 😀 14mo
merelybookish @TheLudicReader We'll see! Im not opposed to bailing if it gets too burdensome. 14mo
sarahbarnes I‘m going to do it! Or at least I intend to - I‘m adding it to my stack of long books that have been lingering half finished on my shelf for the past year that I want to finish in 2023. 😃 14mo
Ruthiella Bonne chance! 👍 14mo
merelybookish @sarahbarnes How far did you get last time? It is definitely slow going for me. I find I can only do a few pages and best in the morning. 14mo
merelybookish @Ruthiella Merci! 🇫🇷 14mo
BarbaraBB Good luck. For me it was hard work at times, it took me several years to finish it but I am very glad I did! 14mo
sarahbarnes I‘ve only made it about halfway through Swann in Love. 😬 It was the same for me - I usually had to read it in the morning and could only read a few pages at a time. 14mo
Vansa @merelybookish not very far in!5% of the series,according to my Kindle-describing the idiosyncratic behaviour of a Mr.Legrandin! I find some of his descriptions really beautiful and the way he articulates particular....feelings are so insightful! 14mo
Centique I hope you enjoy it! I might have already told you but I ended up mixing audio with print for this and it really helped me to switch when I felt a bit bogged down in it. 14mo
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Vansa
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BarbaraBB Proust… such a trip! 14mo
Vansa @BarbaraBB I'm aiming to make my way through In search of lost time, 15 minutes of reading a day! I usually end up reading for more than 15 minutes a day because it's quite immersive. Do I find it wordy many times? Yes. Do i still think it's worth it for his luminous writing every now and then? Also, yes! 14mo
BarbaraBB I agree it is very worth it even though it sometimes boring. I read 20 pages a day or so I remember. But I felt ao proud when I finished them! 14mo
18 likes3 comments
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Vansa
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This is such a stunning sentence

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Taylor

Whether it is that the faith which creates has dried up in me, or that reality takes shape in memory alone, the flowers I am shown today for the first time do not seem to me to be real flowers.

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Taylor

Even I preferred cream cheese when it was pink, when I had been allowed to crush strawberries in it. And these flowers had chosen precisely the color of an edible thing, or of a delicate embellishment to an outfit … one of those colors which, because they offer children the reason for their superiority, seem most obviously beautiful to the eyes of children, and for that reason will always seem more vivid and more natural to them[.]

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Vansa
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Did Swann just invent air quotes?!

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Vansa
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Bibliomania
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"After luncheon the sun, conscious that it was Saturday, would blaze an hour longer in the zenith,..." - Marcel Proust, Swann's Way

What's your favourite weekend reading place? Here's Woman Reading by American Impressionist painter Childe Hassam (1859-1935) #BooksInArt

#books #bookquotes #weekendreads #weekendreading #bibliophile #amreading #booktime

shadows A little far away from human is my favorite reading place( excuse me my English language is not good) 10mo
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LindaLappin
Swann's Way (Centenary) | Marcel Proust
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“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“

truthinfiction Such a mesmerising quote and a beautiful picture. ❤️ 2y
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LindaLappin
Swann's Way | Marcel Proust
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My favorite place for reading Proust
@EadieB

EadieB Nice! Looks very comfortable! 2y
LindaLappin @EadieB it is & quiet too 2y
EadieB @LindaLappin Are you reading from #1001books to read before you die? I‘ve read about 250 of the books. I enjoyed a good many of them. (edited) 2y
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LindaLappin @EadieB thanks for your msg. I am new to Litsy - where can I find the #1001 list? Just re-reading a book I loved from senior year French class when we read excerpts from the overture and have turned to periodically for decades. 2y
EadieB @LindaLappin First of all, welcome to Litsy! You can google “1001 books to read” to find info or use #1001books on Litsy to find people who are reading the books. There is also a list on Goodreads.com or https://www.listchallenges.com/1001-books-you-must-read-2018 and you can check off the books you have read. Don‘t hesitate to tag me if you need anymore help. 2y
truthinfiction Welcome to litsy, Linda! It's a warm community. You will love it here. 😃❤️ 2y
TheSpineView @LindaLappin Welcome to Litsy! 💖🤩📖📘 2y
TheSpineView @EadieB Thanks for Tagging me!🧡🏷 2y
EadieB @TheSpineView You're welcome!
2y
LindaLappin @EadieB just learning about the list now, thank you
2y
LindaLappin @EadieB thank you. It's good to know. 2y
LindaLappin @truthinfiction 🌹 🙏 😁 2y
EadieB @LindaLappin You're welcome! Enjoy your reading! 2y
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review
TheBookStopsHere
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Pickpick

008. Marcel Proust: ISOLT vol 1: The Way By Swann‘s (1913, tr. Lydia Davis, 2004)

Something of a mountain to climb, with this being merely the set-up of the story to come. But throughly enjoyed a daily session, taking a leisurely stroll through the past, soaking up the details.

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rakeshpm

On page 28. Reading Proust day 1. The introduction was really sublime and surreal.

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owennnnnnnnnn
Swann's Way | Marcel Proust

Finished ca. 7/13, 5/5

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Booksnchill
Swann's Way | Marcel Proust
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Here are my top reads of 2020 with the tagged book standing in for the 7 volumes of #Proust2020 year long read. Interesting reading year for me with several top reads published well before 2020 but these are the ones that will stay with me- most of the many 2020 published books I purchased I did not read- time to get to those in 2021 as apparently I need to stare at a book on my shelves for awhile🤷‍♀️ Anyway these are the top of 2020.

BarbaraBB So many good ones. Did you finish Proust within the year? That is so impressive! It took me three years 😃 3y
candority I wanted to read Ducks, Newburyport all year but I‘m so intimidated by it. Maybe I‘ll finally pick it up in 2021 3y
Booksnchill @BarbaraBB I did finish it but switched back and forth between the audio and physical books when I was walking or on long drives- It was excellent to listen to when walking along my own “Stones River Way”! 3y
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Booksnchill @candority I loved it but parceled it out in 60 page blocks and took several weeks to finish it- not that it was slow or boring but simply I like to read several books at a time and I couldn‘t really drag a 1100 page book with me everywhere! Hope you give it a go when you are ready- Happy 2021! 3y
BarbaraBB That sounds fantastic indeed! 3y
candority I may have to try breaking it into blocks as well 😊 3y
lauraisntwilder I just read Earthlings. It was wild! So different from Convenience Store Woman and yet so similar. 3y
Booksnchill @phyhill i was unsure about it as I read it but it has 100% stayed with me- I agree different from CSW but absolutely the same author! 3y
45 likes8 comments
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jveezer
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Proust‘s memory was not just madeleines and tea; he also mentions pain d‘épices, or gingerbread. So I had to make some to go with my tea...

LindaLappin a fabulous new translation -- tho I am still partial to Moncrieff
2y
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katelucia
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chai & madeleines with proust 🤍🤍🤍

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Bibliobear
Swann's Way | Marcel Proust
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“The only true voyage of discovery, the only fountain of Eternal Youth, would be not to visit strange lands but to possess other eyes, to behold the universe through the eyes of another, of a hundred others, to behold the hundred universes that each of them beholds, that each of them is.“

Remembering my favourite neurasthenic, Marcel Proust, on his birthday.

BarbaraBB Such a wonderful quote 💕 4y
KarouBlue ♥️ 💜💚🧡 4y
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arubabookwoman
Swann's Way | Marcel Proust
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#top6reads Through 6/30, I‘ve read 66 books, and Swann‘s Way was the only 5 star read. The next 5, all 4 star reads (no 4 1/2 star reads) would be Fever Dream by Samanta Schweblin, Night Theater by Vikram Paralkar, Malice by Keigo Higashino, Cherry by Nico Walker, and Death Comes for the Archbishop by Willa Cather. Runners up (also 4 star) would be After the Fire by Henning Menkell, Ride the Pink Horse by Dorothy Hughes, and maybe👇🏻👇🏻👇🏻

arubabookwoman The Most Fun We Ever Had by Claire Lombardo. And two 4 star NF books were Midnight in Chernobyl and A very Stable Genius. #Liz_M. (edited) 4y
Tanisha_A Great list! Another screenshot. 😁 4y
BarbaraBB Great selection! 4y
batsy Cather's Archbishop also on my list! And Fever Dream is a brilliant book. 4y
38 likes4 comments
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PaulAndrus
Swann's Way | Marcel Proust
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"I don't deny it," answered Swann in some bewilderment. "The fault I find with our journalism is that it forces us to take an interest in some fresh triviality or other every day, whereas only three or four books in a lifetime give us anything that is of real importance."

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PaulAndrus
Swann's Way | Marcel Proust
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But then, even in the most insignificant details of our daily life, none of us can be said to constitute a material whole, which is identical for everyone, and need only be turned up like a page in an account-book or the record of a will; our social personality is a creation of the thoughts of other people. Even the simple act which we describe as "seeing someone we know" is to some extent an intellectual process. We pack the physical outline of..

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GatheringBooks
Swann's Way | Marcel Proust
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review
Palimpsest
Swann's Way | Marcel Proust
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Pickpick

Aside from perhaps some poetry and Shakespeare, I don‘t think I‘ve read anyone who can capture the singular beauty of an image in time using all senses more gorgeously than Proust. There were moments in this book, especially in Combray and again in Place-Names•The Name where I wanted to dissolve into the scene. I think someone‘s review on Goodreads said it best, that this is an ontological look at love as even as it tore me apart, I liked it.

Freespirit Wow great review! 4y
Booksnchill So great- we have a #Proust2020 readalong- just finished V.2 and on to Guermantes Way. His voice pulls me along through my isolation days- almost feel like the narrator- confined but noticing everything. I have found it a joy! 4y
Palimpsest @Freespirit thanks! I really enjoyed this book. 4y
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Palimpsest @Booksnchill oh, I would love to join #Proust2020 and I have the set, but I don‘t think I can get through Within a Budding Grove that quickly. I could try. Thanks for sharing that info with me. 4y
Booksnchill @Palimpsest we haven‘t set any schedule- generally 2 months per book- I was a bit behind myself- I‘ll tag you in the posts if you are interested🥰 4y
Palimpsest @Booksnchill Yes, that would be great! Thanks so much! 😊 4y
BarbaraBB Kudos for finishing it! Looking forward to your reading the next one! 4y
54 likes7 comments
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Mtroiano
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Proust lives up to the hype. I loved this beautifully written book ❤️
#24b4monday

Butterfinger I enjoy reading classics too, but haven't read Proust. 4y
Andrew65 A great time 👏👏👏 4y
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Mtroiano
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Current stack for #24b4monday I‘m hoping to finish today.

Social distancing day 15

Andrew65 A great time 👏👏👏 4y
SheReadsAndWrites Love the mug!! Where is it from? I collect those from every city I visit- I love them! ❤️ 4y
Mtroiano @SheReadsAndWrites this one is Pittsburgh. We collect them too though mostly my husband brings them home from business trips 4y
SheReadsAndWrites ❤️☕️ 4y
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Mtroiano
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Happy Friday, y‘all! #booksandbeer #24b4monday

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Mtroiano
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It‘s hot enough to get the water hose out! ☀️☀️☀️

Social distancing day 14

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Mtroiano
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This one has been in my TBR for quite a while. It feels good to finally start it!

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Lcsmcat
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Happy birthday @Palimpsest I hope it‘s a day to make memories.

Palimpsest @Lcsmcat Thank you so much! It is so thoughtful of you to send me this posting. I love the madeleines! I will try to make it a happy day. Your thoughtful gesture truly means so much to me. 😊 4y
AmyG Happy Birthday! 🎂🎉🎈🎁 4y
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Palimpsest
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Keeping with #keepLitsypositive my Christmas cactus is in bloom this week and I saw that @ValerieAndBooks has shared a picture of hers, so I wanted to share mine as well. I‘m still loving this book!

Linsy Beautiful! 💕 4y
diovival So pretty! 4y
Leftcoastzen 👍Beautiful! 4y
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BookishMe Cheerful colour! 4y
squirrelbrain Lovely! 💕 4y
ValerieAndBooks I love it 💗 💕 !! Thanks for sharing yours 😊 4y
Redwritinghood Happy birthday! 🎂🎂 4y
67 likes7 comments
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Palimpsest
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I recently started reading Swann‘s Way and am enjoying the reminiscing and the pace. I took this picture on a walk in the woods today. I was surprised to see the fern because it‘s only in the 40s Fahrenheit where I live. I love ferns, all plants really, and this was a much needed moment. #keeplitsypositive

Litsi I happened across this as an audio book and was super impressed by the opening chapter. This is one where I can‘t decide whether I should listen deeply to it without the noise of reading or whether I should steep in the ink. It was so beautiful. 4y
Palimpsest @Litsi I‘m only through the first chapter as well. Whichever way you choose, I‘d say you can‘t go wrong. I agree it‘s beautiful prose. 4y
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rachelk
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I have finally started the book that‘s been on my TBR most of my life. Thanks @TheAromaofBooks #BookSpin for the game that‘s getting me to do it!

TheAromaofBooks Wow, I'm honestly a little honored to be the final nudge to read it!! 4y
rachelk @TheAromaofBooks Let‘s hope I really get through it🤞 4y
TheAromaofBooks You got this!! 4y
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Lcsmcat It‘s so worth the time and effort! 4y
rachelk @Lcsmcat @TheAromaofBooks Thanks for the encouragement! 4y
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review
Centique
Swann's Way | Marcel Proust
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Pickpick

I finished this last night @Booksnchill #proust2020 and I have to thank you for the impetus to keep at it. I found this slow going at times - but there were such treasures in here to be uncovered - ideas Proust illuminates slowly but in depth. He really does capture interior moments in a profound way - such as the way in which a taste or smell takes you back in time or how the idea of a place or a person can be more thrilling in your mind than ⬇️

Centique it is in reality. I want to re-read this and be able to luxuriate in the descriptions - I feel I will actually enjoy it more on a second reading now that I‘ve acclimatised to his style . 4 stars from me now but I might very well turn that to 5 because I think it will stay with me. 😍 4y
Cinfhen Beautiful review 4y
Centique @Cinfhen thank you lovely Cindy 😘 4y
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LauraBrook What an excellent review! I wish I had a copy to start reading right now. 4y
Booksnchill @Centique i think you are correct as I have now read Swann‘s Way 3 times and your description of aclimatizing to his style is apt. So pleased you found joy in it and thank you for your lovely review!🥰☕️🕰 4y
Cathythoughts Excellent review & such lovely covers ✨✨✨✨✨ 4y
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blurb
arubabookwoman
Swann's Way | Marcel Proust
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arubabookwoman Don't you wish you could visit Combray in the spring? See the flowering hawthorne and all the other spring flowers? Eat a meal prepared by Francoise? Watch the street scene with Aunt Leonie? Visit the medieval churches? Walk the Meseglise Way? Proust makes it all so real and vivid and sensual and lush. 4y
Lcsmcat I‘d say yes to all but watching with Aunt Leonie - I think she‘s better from a distance than face to face! 😀 4y
Booksnchill I‘d like to see how mad I could make her!🤣 4y
KarouBlue I‘d just love a cup of tea with Francoise!! 4y
Centique You‘re so right! I want to walk Guermantes way and see the hawthorn and the churches and maybe have a chat to the gardener and Francoise while she is plucking a chicken and he is bemoaning the government. 😍😍 4y
38 likes5 comments