IN SEARCH OF LOST TIME - Complete Edition (All 7 Books in One Volume). Marcel Proust

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       Marcel Proust

      In Search of Lost Time - Complete Edition (All 7 Books in One Volume)

      The Masterpiece of 20th Century Literature

       Published by

      

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       [email protected] 2017 OK Publishing ISBN 978-80-272-2169-1

      Table of Contents

       SWANN'S WAY (Du Côté De Chez Swann)

       WITHIN A BUDDING GROVE (À L'ombre Des Jeunes Filles En Fleurs)

       THE GUERMANTES WAY (Le Côté De Guermantes)

       CITIES OF THE PLAIN (Sodome Et Gomorrhe)

       THE CAPTIVE (La Prisonnière)

       THE SWEET CHEAT GONE (Albertine Disparue)

       TIME REGAINED (Le Temps Retrouvé)

      SWANN'S WAY

       (Du Côté De Chez Swann)

       Table of Contents

      "When the sessions of sweet silent thought

       I summon up remembrance of things past. . ."

      TRANSLATOR'S DEDICATION

      To

       E. J. C.

      Here, Summer lingering, loiter I

       When I, with Summer, should be gone . . .

       Where only London lights the sky

       I go, and with me journeys "Swann"

      Whose pages' dull, laborious woof

       Covers a warp of working-times,

       Of firelit nights beneath your roof

       And sunlit days beneath your limes,

      While, both at once or each in turn,

       Sharp-tongued but smooth, like buttered knives,

       We pared with studied unconcern

       The problems of our private lives;

      Those tiny problems, dense yet clear,

       Like ivory balls by Chinese craft,

       Pierced (where each hole absorbed a tear

       And rounded (where the assembly laughed).

      Did all our laughter muffle pain,

       Our candour simulate pretence?

       Fear not. I shall not come again

       To tease you with indifference.

      Yet I may gaze for Oakham spire

       Where London suns set, watery-pale,

       And dream, while tides of crimson fire

       Sweep, smoking, over Catmos vale.

      C. K. S. M.

       Michaelmas 1921

Table of Contents

       Overture

       Combray

       Swann in Love

       Place-Names: The Name

      Overture

       Table of Contents

      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 François 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.

      I would lay my cheeks gently against the comfortable cheeks of my pillow, as plump and blooming as the cheeks of babyhood. Or I would strike a match to look at my watch. Nearly midnight. The hour when an invalid, who has been obliged to start on a journey and to sleep in a strange hotel, awakens in a moment of illness and sees with glad relief a streak of daylight shewing under his bedroom door. Oh, joy of joys! it is morning. The servants will be about in a minute: he can ring, and some one will come to look after him. The thought of being made comfortable gives him strength to endure his pain. He is certain he heard footsteps: they come nearer, and then die away. The ray of light beneath his door is extinguished. It is midnight; some one has turned out the gas; the last servant has gone to bed, and he must lie all night in agony with no one to bring him any help.

      I would fall asleep, and often I would be awake again for short snatches only, just long enough to hear the regular creaking of the wainscot, or to open my eyes to settle the shifting kaleidoscope of the darkness, to savour, in an instantaneous flash of perception, the sleep which lay heavy upon the furniture, the room, the whole surroundings of which I formed but an insignificant part and whose unconsciousness I should very soon return to share. Or, perhaps, while I was asleep I had returned without the least effort to an earlier