Simply Proust

By Jack Jordan

“Simply Proust pulls off with ease the arduous task of making Marcel Proust’s masterwork accessible, without sacrificing none of the complexity that makes it one of the most important novels of the 20th Century. To do this, Jack Jordan vividly paints vast the cultural, scientific, and philosophical background that fed In Search of Lost Time. Armed with this knowledge, both new and repeat readers are bound to gain fresh insights into the brilliance of Proust’s novel.”
—Hervé G. Picherit, Associate Professor of French, University of Texas at Austin

Marcel Proust (1871-1922) was born in Paris during a time of great social and political upheaval, a ferment that is dealt with extensively in his monumental work In Search of Lost Time. He was a sickly child and spent the earlier part of his short life pursuing a variety of sometimes frivolous activities, which led to his not being taken seriously as a writer. It was not until 1909, when he was 38 years old, that he began work on the groundbreaking novel for which he is known, a task that consumed the rest of his life. 

In Simply Proust, Professor Jack Louis Jordan presents an incisive, yet thoroughly accessible, introduction to Proust’s landmark work, helping the reader to fully appreciate the scope of the author’s achievement, as well as the fascinating process that underlay its creation. Emphasizing the fundamental role of psychology and the unconscious, Jordan shows how Proust’s methodology and our understanding of his novel are connected, and how this makes for a unique and endlessly revealing literary experience. 

At once philosophical, psychological, and deeply human, Simply Proust offers an invaluable entry point into a masterpiece of world literature and takes the measure of the flawed and brilliant man who transformed the material of his life into a transcendent work of art.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Simply Charly
• Release date: Feb 4, 2021
• ISBN: 9781943657445

Jack Jordan

Jack Jordan is the global bestselling author of Anything for Her, My Girl, A Woman Scorned, Before Her Eyes, Night by Night, Do No Harm and Conviction, and an Amazon No. 1 bestseller in the UK, Canada and Australia. Do No Harm was described as ‘chilling’ by Sarah Pearse, ‘brilliant’ by Lesley Kara and ‘pulse-racing’ by Louise Candlish. It was an instant Times bestseller on first publication and a Waterstones Thriller of the Month pick.  To find out more, follow Jack on Twitter, Instagram and TikTok: @JackJordanBooks @jackjordan_author @jackjordan_author

Book preview

titles.

1Marcel Proust’s Early Days

Marcel Valentin Louis Eugène Georges Proust was born on July 10, 1871, in Auteuil, a suburb of Paris. His father, Adrien Proust, was born in 1834 in Illiers, a small town near Chartres, not far from Paris. His mother, Jeanne Clémence Weil, was born in 1849, in Paris. Both of his parents were from relatively wealthy families. His father was Catholic and his mother was Jewish, and even though Marcel and his brother Robert were raised Catholic, religion was not a dominant force in the family. When his parents were married, the Second Empire was ending, and the Third Republic was beginning. It was the start of new Constitutional Laws, establishing a regime based on parliamentary supremacy.

Even for the relatively wealthy, this was not an easy time, and the newlyweds had to survive the sieges and bombardments of the Prussians and then the insurrection of the Communards. The childhood sicknesses that plagued Marcel could be attributed to these circumstances. Later, when he was nine, he almost died from an asthma attack, the first of many to follow and which would have a profound effect on him for the rest of his life. One bright aspect of this illness was that he spent holidays at the beach in Normandy, where he could breathe easier thanks to the sea air. The time he spent there was good for his health, and the area would become a regular vacation destination. The town of Cabourg would become Proust’s inspiration for Balbec, the seaside resort featured in his book. His brother, Robert, who was born in 1873, did not suffer from Marcel’s ailments and became a doctor, like their father. Though they seem to have gotten along relatively well despite their differences and usual sibling rivalries, Proust’s Narrator does not have a