Snow has come to Copenhagen. And although this normally implies that everything slows down (traffic, sounds, conversations) it has had the opposite effect on me. During the last few days, when all I could do was to sit indoors, I have managed to move a bit further on my thesis on Proust and sleep.
After a few weeks of intensive reading I am finally commencing the actual writing process. But already I am discovering the difficulty of the task set before me. One question keeps popping up in my head : How to start writing about 'A la recherche du temps perdu'? My advisor suggested to me, that I spend some serious time finding the right tone or voice for my thesis. My own voice that is.
Since 'La recherche' - as a classic in world literature - is so frequently commented upon it is quite easy to get lost in the sheer amount of analyses, readings, theories, thematic studies etc. etc. that are available out there. Since the publication of the first volume of the novel in 1913 thousands and thousands of studies on Prousts work have seen the light of day and noone can possibly form an overview of this vast and constantly expanding archive of research. Even compared to the work itself this amount of Proustiania almost attains comical proportions. Proust's work is rapidly becoming one of the most studied texts in world literature - alongside Shakespeare, Homer, Dante and Joyce. The demand from my advisor thus seemed a bit contradictory. For how do I find my own voice amidst such an imposing field of scholarly research on Proust? And then again - finding my own voice seems the only true solution.
Whenever I start a new project of academic writing I am often reminded of Harold Blooms famous term - 'the anxiety of influence'. Even though Bloom speaks of the anxiety that 'new' poets might sense when faced with the entire history of poetic masterpieces it occurs to me that the phrase is also applicable to academic scholarship. In my case it all comes down to this: How do I say something about 'La recherche' that hasn't already been said and done? My immediate answer to this question was: I simply don't! Instead of trying to come up with 'my own' reading of Proust's novel I decided to engage with other readings that I found useful for 'showing' what I, myself, actually wanted to say. Not a very 'straighforward' approach, I admit that.
At first I wanted to look at the novel through the lens of Gérard Genette, the french structuralist who wrote 'Narrative Discourse: An Essay in Method'. Genette uses 'La recherche' to demonstrate his own theory of narrative - but in the mean time he conducts a narratological reading of Proust. The scope of Genette's essay is thus both theoretical and practical. One specific term from the essay caught my attention. When speaking of the structure of Proust's narrative Genette mentions "the transfer point of the insomnias (relais des insomnies)" (Genette, p.44) The idea that certain structural sections of a text can function as 'transfer points' is quite compelling. It implies that a textual structure is flexible and mobile (note the railway metaphor in the french version). This made me think - quite spontaneously - on one of the first descriptions of sleep in Proust's novel:
"Je me demandais quelle heure il pouvait être ; j'entendais le sifflement des trains qui, plus ou moins éloigné, comme le chant d'un oiseau dans une forêt, relevant les distances, me décrivait l'étendue de la campagne déserte où le voyageur se hâte vers la station prochaine." (Swann,p.3-4)
/
("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."(Scott Moncrieff's translation))
The narrator, Marcel, is lying awake, reflecting on the sensations surrounding his sleeplessness. In this instance a simple sound from afar sends his mind on a journey to distant places. And the narrative travels with him. In the next passage le voyageur is experiencing the strangeness of being in transit:
"et le petit chemin qu'il suit va être gravé dans son souvenir par l'excitation qu'il doit à des lieux nouveaux, à des actes inaccoutumés, à la causerie récente et aux adieux sous la lampe étrangère qui le suivent encore dans le silence de la nuit, à la douceur prochaine du retour." (Swann,p.4)
/
"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."(Scott Moncrieff's translation)
This movement can be described as a transfer point. When Marcel's insomnia suddenly propels the narrative towards a different setting something happens with the story told. It is shifting to a different level - to a different track. Genette's term can thus inspire a reading of Proust's novel that is focussing on the structure of the work.
To a certain extent this is exactly what I wish to do! My overall idea is that sleep is a structuring element in the work - just as Genette's term helps emphasize. Only problem is: if I refer to Genette's reading, I also reveal that my own reading is not 'new'. It is 'secondary' (read: inferior) to Genette's. Even though this is obviously the case (I do not pretend to display Genette's level of erudition in my writing) it is nevertheless a weak starting point for any type of academic writing. You simply need to sense that what you write is not reduced to a thirdhand level of engagement with the texts. It needs a sense of being primary - of having immediate importance.
Basically, this is what the question from my advisor boils down to. In my approach to 'La recherche' I simply removed myself too much from the actual text. And this surely poses a problem. If my reading of Proust's work only displays a sort of thirdhand or very periphery engagement with the text it is not likely that the reader of my text will find it very convincing - even interesting.
My discovery in this process has been that, when writing about literature, it is pivotal to primarily engage with the work itself and not to view it through the lens of some secondary text (disregarded how appropriate that text might be). For most scholars on literature this is probably quite self evident. For others, maybe not. I for one did not expect that so much 'freedom' would be attained from simply putting the 'theory' to the side. This I think has to do with a certain quality inherent to the works themselves. Not that literature is clearly separate from the field of theory (especially in the case of Proust, the divide is quite blurred). But something in the works compels you to engage with issues relevant to literature in a different way than most theoretical texts do.
So my decision has been to start at a 'point zero'. To disregard the theory and basically just write a few pages in my own words. Not that this approach is easier - but it definitely is more rewarding. And as I slowly progress, I discover this voice that I at some point might start calling my own.
Yes, snowy days do have their advantages...
