Right with you on the "book" stuff. Always baffled and frustrated me. A huge drag on civilization in my opinion.
Love the passages about the yellow wall. Never heard that before and it's terrific. I'm going to print it out and put in the notebook with other terrific stuff, which is pretty thin actually. Thanks for posting it.
Tod, thank you so much for your comment! I'd read that passage in Proust 25 years ago, and it struck a chord with me, I couldn't get it out of my head. Keep collecting terrific stuff, I'm sure your notebook will become very big, good luck!
I love that you brought my attention to the yellow wall. Have you read Art Objects by Jeanette Winterson? If not, the title essay is about the importance of taking time to really look at a work of art. Thank you for such an intellectually stimulating perspective!
It took me two years, when I was in college, to read the Recherche from start to finish (the Italian Meridiani edition full of notes and comments). Every time I finished a tome, I would take a break and relax by reading a couple of Sanantonios, the delightful comedy crime novels written by Frederic Dard (https://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sanantonio).
I do remember Sanantonio, my parents loved him too! That's the value of great literature: it caters for all tastes, and you can choose, according to your wishes. Sometimes, you need a nutritious roast with all the trimmings, sometimes a light but not less satisfying onigiri.
I knew this passage, though I’ve not read the book ; however, I’d not seen it for a long time.
Fascinated by Proust’s sentences, structure and subtlety.
First, I read the English translation. It didn’t quite work for me, much of the meaning went right over my head. Maybe a problem with the rhythm—I don’t know. Then I read the French, and entered another space.
Fascinating, this dynamic mind-space, there’s something about the feel of it here that reminds me, not of Vermeer but of a Cezanne still life, apples not outlined… I struggle to express this sense of their presence—volume, color, density, how they come out at you, how you’ve entered that vibrant space and they, the apples, the oranges—whatever—are there, relating to you, and you to them. And you’re reliving how the painter sensed them, not just things seen but they’re here for him and he for them, you’re in touch with a living relationship. Passionate interaction between Cezanne’s mind and those apples and oranges he’s contemplating… there, in the room, it’s all breathing… Warm, quiet resonance.
Back to Bergotte, it’s a man’s mind, and he’s living, looking, thinking (not much taken with anything he’s seeing) until… that View of Delft. First, the whole great image. He’s entered, passing the pink sand on the river bank, those figures, people standing there. Suddenly, drawn to, drawn into that “precious substance”, a little yellow patch of wall. Stunned, losing footing, aware of what has come, he’s grasping at that patch of perfection… Thoughts, regrets, “I should have”… arising. And while the poem’s mood of exhilaration is utterly different from the moment when Bergotte’s mind is drawn into the yellow wall and he’s passing from life to death, something reminded me of the last line of a Yeats poem… “In balance with this life, this death”.
Now, the mind space changes and we seem to be somewhere between Bergotte’s dying awareness and Proust’s reflections.
That word “atheist” is interesting. It’s as though a critic examining the passage had inserted his own view here. And of course, when you consider the context, the word’s not altogether irrelevant. But it is an implant, it does not belong here. Why not? Because it is two-dimensional and out of context in a living, breathing multi-dimensional space. A piece of interpretation, a concept, a belief, something secondary that has wandered into an area that is more subtle, more directly perceptual even in regard to the thoughts that are present here. And subtlety is precisely an aspect of the artist’s mind, refinement, discernment, lucid awareness.
I’d be inclined to try out “a discerning artist”.
***
When my pianist stepson—another product of Saint Petersburg—was living in the Hague, I recall him wanting to find Vermeer’s viewpoint and give a concert there. Well, either that or he was talking of Sviatoslav Richter’s fascination with the painting and his desire to express it in his playing. As I don’t quite remember, I’ve asked him to remind me.
Peter, thank you so much for this wonderful contribution. And I agree, "a discerning artist" would have been not only a more faithful choice, but a more "rounded" one. I'm going to read Yeats and the blog about Richter.
Right with you on the "book" stuff. Always baffled and frustrated me. A huge drag on civilization in my opinion.
Love the passages about the yellow wall. Never heard that before and it's terrific. I'm going to print it out and put in the notebook with other terrific stuff, which is pretty thin actually. Thanks for posting it.
Tod, thank you so much for your comment! I'd read that passage in Proust 25 years ago, and it struck a chord with me, I couldn't get it out of my head. Keep collecting terrific stuff, I'm sure your notebook will become very big, good luck!
Great thing to have with you all this time !
I love that you brought my attention to the yellow wall. Have you read Art Objects by Jeanette Winterson? If not, the title essay is about the importance of taking time to really look at a work of art. Thank you for such an intellectually stimulating perspective!
I haven't read it, but thank you for mentioning it, Margo. Another book for the TBR pile!
It took me two years, when I was in college, to read the Recherche from start to finish (the Italian Meridiani edition full of notes and comments). Every time I finished a tome, I would take a break and relax by reading a couple of Sanantonios, the delightful comedy crime novels written by Frederic Dard (https://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sanantonio).
I do remember Sanantonio, my parents loved him too! That's the value of great literature: it caters for all tastes, and you can choose, according to your wishes. Sometimes, you need a nutritious roast with all the trimmings, sometimes a light but not less satisfying onigiri.
The Yellow Wall
I knew this passage, though I’ve not read the book ; however, I’d not seen it for a long time.
Fascinated by Proust’s sentences, structure and subtlety.
First, I read the English translation. It didn’t quite work for me, much of the meaning went right over my head. Maybe a problem with the rhythm—I don’t know. Then I read the French, and entered another space.
Fascinating, this dynamic mind-space, there’s something about the feel of it here that reminds me, not of Vermeer but of a Cezanne still life, apples not outlined… I struggle to express this sense of their presence—volume, color, density, how they come out at you, how you’ve entered that vibrant space and they, the apples, the oranges—whatever—are there, relating to you, and you to them. And you’re reliving how the painter sensed them, not just things seen but they’re here for him and he for them, you’re in touch with a living relationship. Passionate interaction between Cezanne’s mind and those apples and oranges he’s contemplating… there, in the room, it’s all breathing… Warm, quiet resonance.
Back to Bergotte, it’s a man’s mind, and he’s living, looking, thinking (not much taken with anything he’s seeing) until… that View of Delft. First, the whole great image. He’s entered, passing the pink sand on the river bank, those figures, people standing there. Suddenly, drawn to, drawn into that “precious substance”, a little yellow patch of wall. Stunned, losing footing, aware of what has come, he’s grasping at that patch of perfection… Thoughts, regrets, “I should have”… arising. And while the poem’s mood of exhilaration is utterly different from the moment when Bergotte’s mind is drawn into the yellow wall and he’s passing from life to death, something reminded me of the last line of a Yeats poem… “In balance with this life, this death”.
Now, the mind space changes and we seem to be somewhere between Bergotte’s dying awareness and Proust’s reflections.
That word “atheist” is interesting. It’s as though a critic examining the passage had inserted his own view here. And of course, when you consider the context, the word’s not altogether irrelevant. But it is an implant, it does not belong here. Why not? Because it is two-dimensional and out of context in a living, breathing multi-dimensional space. A piece of interpretation, a concept, a belief, something secondary that has wandered into an area that is more subtle, more directly perceptual even in regard to the thoughts that are present here. And subtlety is precisely an aspect of the artist’s mind, refinement, discernment, lucid awareness.
I’d be inclined to try out “a discerning artist”.
***
When my pianist stepson—another product of Saint Petersburg—was living in the Hague, I recall him wanting to find Vermeer’s viewpoint and give a concert there. Well, either that or he was talking of Sviatoslav Richter’s fascination with the painting and his desire to express it in his playing. As I don’t quite remember, I’ve asked him to remind me.
Perhaps you’ve read this in the original Russian?
http://sviatoslavrichter.blogspot.com/2008/08/youri-borissov-du-ct-de-chez-richter.html
I read Monsaingeon’s book, not this one…
*
Shall be recommending Bread and Roses as soon as I can get round to it… and read more of it. Enjoying and intrigued by all I’ve seen.
[The Yeats poem was An Irish Airman Foresees His Death.]
Peter, thank you so much for this wonderful contribution. And I agree, "a discerning artist" would have been not only a more faithful choice, but a more "rounded" one. I'm going to read Yeats and the blog about Richter.