---
product_id: 104323289
title: "Swann's Way Paperback – May 27, 2015"
brand: "marcel proust"
price: "VT10111"
currency: VUV
in_stock: true
reviews_count: 8
url: https://www.desertcart.vu/products/104323289-swanns-way-paperback-may-27-2015
store_origin: VU
region: Vanuatu
---

# Swann's Way Paperback – May 27, 2015

**Brand:** marcel proust
**Price:** VT10111
**Availability:** ✅ In Stock

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- **What is this?** Swann's Way Paperback – May 27, 2015 by marcel proust
- **How much does it cost?** VT10111 with free shipping
- **Is it available?** Yes, in stock and ready to ship
- **Where can I buy it?** [www.desertcart.vu](https://www.desertcart.vu/products/104323289-swanns-way-paperback-may-27-2015)

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- marcel proust enthusiasts

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## Description

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## Customer Reviews

### ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ 







  
  
    New English translation makes Proust very approchable
  

*by P***V on Reviewed in the United States on October 10, 2017*

"Swann's Way" is the first installment in Marcel Proust's multi-volume "In Search Of Lost Time" (formerly "Remembrance Of Things Past"). "Swann's Way"  was finished in 1912 and first published in 1913. The publisher submitted it to a writing contest, but it didn't win."Swann's Way" was written originally in French. The first English translation appeared in 1922 (the year of Proust's death). This translation is part of a long-term project by Penguin Books to create a brand new English translation of "In Search" using a team of translators. The entire project was published in Britain in 2002. US saw the release of the first four volumes in 2004. But the US will not see the rest of the series until 2019 at the earliest. (The British releases of the remaining volumes can still be purchased through Amazon.)This is my first experience with Proust. Proust is not a story-teller like John Steinbeck or Mark Twain. Instead he spends a lot of time observing what's around him and describing what he sees in highly poetic language. You'll see long discussions about the weather, the wildflowers and the trees, the clothes people wear, the vehicles they travel in, and the music they listen to. Proust makes many references to classical music like Mozart, Liszt and Wagner."Swann's Way" contains three sections: Combray, Swann In Love, and Place Names: The Name."Combray" is a boy's memoir of life in Combray, a small French town. It has no real plot. The famous "madeleine" is a desert cake dipped in tea that the narrator bites into and suddenly remembers many forgotten memories of his past. The boy narrator talks about his love of reading and infatuation with the theater, his reclusive grand-aunt Leonie Octave, his housekeeper Francoise, the evening visits of Swann, and his obsession with getting goodnight kisses from his mom. "Combray" explains the book's title: there are two walking paths out of Combray. One of those paths runs past the home of Swann, and is therefore nicknamed "Swann's Way.""Swann In Love" has been described as a novel in a novel. But again it read more like a memoir than a real story. The section takes place before the events in "Combray."Swann is a well-to-do socialite who is invited to the Verdurins' soiree by fellow socialite Odette de Crecy. Swann falls in love with Odette but he is infatuated and eventually lapses into obsession. He finds himself spying on her, stalking her, stealing her mail, and using her friends to gain information. Amazingly, Odette continues to see Swann as a friend, but he just uses these occasions to pry into her past affairs and rumors of lesbianism. Not surprisingly, she drifts away from him."Place-Names: The Name" is the shortest section (supposedly truncated per publisher's directions), and could be retitled "The Narrator In Love." It is yet another memoir of another man (actually a boy) in love with none other than Swann's daughter Gilberte (the name). The boy is not as obsessed as Swann was, but nevertheless causes much stress for his poor governess when he insists on walking to various places in Paris in the off chance of finding Gilberte.Proust is one of those authors that, like fruits & vegetables, is supposed to ‘good' for you. Fortunately, Proust is not avant-garde or experimental, and his language is straightforward and not that hard to understand (probably because the translator made it so). Even Proust's famously long sentences are heavily punctuated, so they aren't too hard to follow.Since "Swann's Way" is a classic, I'm going to leave it to the scholars to rate the novel itself.But five stars go to Lydia Davis' readable translation, the highly informative intro, the detailed footnotes, and the attractive book design.

### ⭐ 







  
  
    DO NOT BUY THE HARD COVER -- NOT LYDIA DAVIS, NOT PENGUIN
  

*by J***A on Reviewed in the United States on January 24, 2018*

THIS REVIEW IS FOR THE SIMON & BROWN HARD COVER that is listed as the hard copy version to Penguin Classic's Lydia Davis translation. IT'S NOT THE SAME BOOK! GET THE PAPERBACK VERSION INSTEAD. I've been reading that Penguin Classics Lydia Davis version is the best version for newcomers to Proust's work. It's supposed to be easier to read, without all the post-Victorian embellishments of earlier translations. It's supposed to have an introduction by her in the front and is loaded with well-researched footnotes. The HARD COPY version with the blue cover and yellow font has NONE of that. In fact, Lydia Davis's name isn't anywhere in or on the book. It's not even published by Penguin Classics. The publsher is Simon & Brown, a third-rate self-publishing company (go ahead, google them -- they're not legit), and it features the old Moncrief translation with no  footnotes  You could basically read this version for free off the internet. I've contacted Amazon for a refund and will be exchanging it for Penguin Classic's Lydia Davis translation in paperback. It's confusing because the bootlegged Simon & Brown copy is listed as the hard copy version of the legitimate Penguin Classic paperback. Amazon, please fix this!

### ⭐⭐⭐⭐ 







  
  
    Stream of Conscious in enormous depth and including wonderful character studies
  

*by P***D on Reviewed in the United States on August 2, 2020*

In the western literary canon there are several recognized siege reads (lovely pun that ) that tend to mark off the dilettante reader from the serious.  Horse choker reads of established classical standing. To have read and maybe understood from this class is the difference between mountain climbing as a day long exercise and a mountaineering exercise that is the culminating expedition built on months of preparation.Among these reads are the Great Russian slayers of trees, War and Peace, Anna Karenina, Crime and Punishment. In more recent times is the great English language challenge Ulysses. In attempting to review Marcel Proust’s Swann’s Way, I am making a public declaration of my intent to read all seven volumes of In Search of Lost time. In the past I have taken advantages of some of the lovely graphic novel versions adapted and wondrously drawn by Stephane Heuet. This time I have the paperback translation by Lydia Davis.  It is said to be an easier read for a modern reader and I have reason to believe that the original translation C. K, Scott Moncrieff is a bit stogy and slightly bowdlerized.I am not going to return another gushing "is it not wondrous?" type review.  While hardly my first exposure to stream of conscious, Swann’s Way is orders of magnitude beyond reasonable. Sentences stretch out as if in support of a national shortage of periods and planning to stop at the end of the next paragraph is certain to upset your schedule for the rest of the day. There are passages of glittering, fine and insightful observations and musings, but catching and holding on to any one is rather like seizing the finer glints of sun in crystalline waters while standing in the middle of a water fall. I also suspect that some of these wonderful thoughts, if held still and analyzed read as very deep while not making much sense.Swann’s Way begins by introducing ups to our narrator, Marcel. In 47 pages we get a detailed, recollection of his 6 or 8-year-old self, engaged in a highly complex almost creepy campaign to get a good night kiss from his mother.  So yes, Marcel is a Momma’s Boy- the caps are deliberate.His parents are middle class, and well connected. Among their frequent guest is Swann. A man with even higher social connection however hampered by his unfortunate marriage. Continuing into the next chapter we meet more of Marcel’s family. His parents seem decent well-grounded people. Obviously his Mother is the source of good things. His Father can be coldly fierce, but given to great understanding and a knowledge of when to let the boy have his way. An Aunt who is comically hypochondriac and an all-time busy body. There is an Uncle with a steady series of lady friends of a type not admissible to the rest of the family. His grandmother is clearly his favorite and a center of his youth.The single overriding and central theme- occupying most or all of every human contact is: Who has the status to be recognized, if only on the street or at parties, who is allowed to visit and who has sufficient standing to be visiting as a family? The series is titled The Remembrance of Things Past because of the famous scene of Marcel inhaling the aroma of a tea-soaked madeleine cookie which triggers the rest of the 7 books. For all of that most honored literary device, the books could just as easily been Remembrances of Snobbery Past.  Money, Politics, High Art  and more than anything - class standing fill the pages.We now know that Marcel is a Moma’s boy and that the guiding principal of his upbringing is snobbery. His main interests seem to be flowers, especially hawthorns, actors/actresses and literature. He is most likely to be found bursting into tears, lost in complex reveries and indulging a highly self-center romantic overwrought thought process or in need of a private physician.Incidentally there are two main routes into town. On passes by the aforementioned Swann’s estates, and is therefore Swann’s Way, (for some reason it has two names) and another longer route known as The Guermantes Way. These two routes are going to be important. Each get theirown book. What they are to represent is not yet clear.Before leaving this part of the book, it must be said to Proust’s credit that he has a sly sense of humor. However comic his relatives, he respects them. We may laugh. He does not.Having several times mentioned Swann, his connections and his unfortunate marriage we move back in time to observe Swann in Love. He meets with a well-known courtesan, Odette. A woman of decidedly mixed reputation. Swann is something of a player and his fall is a gradual thing. From first date to first kiss is protracted, but quickly becomes best described as love sickness. Proust again to his credit gives us in detail what it is to be so completely smitten as to loose perspective, pride and whatever equanimity or equipoise natural to a well off, man about town.This book ends with Marcel now in his teens, becoming a habitué in Swann’s home. Initially he is a close friend of Swann’s daughter. Indeed, she is a possible future wife. Marcel is more fascinated by Madam Swann.Having finished Swann’s Way I had developed a reading approach that kept me going. The quality of the writing is such that I could pass through 20 pages sometimes without effort. I may not have absorbed just how great it all was, but neither had I been defeated by how wordy it all is. I had sufficient momentum to move directly into book 2, In the shadow of Young Girls in Flower. That review will follow in its turn.

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*Product available on Desertcart Vanuatu*
*Store origin: VU*
*Last updated: 2026-02-27*