The first thing that came to mind when I read Proust’s ‘Combray’ was a sense of nostalgia. I grew up reading a lot of classics, especially from Victorian England writers and the language that the English translation of ‘Combray’ uses is very familiar to some of that used in those books I used to read. The writing style is almost the same too and it was a nice bast from the past, so to say. However, at the same time I found that it is vastly different too, especially the use of ‘first person narrative’ used to write the story and the reflective quality to the writing, more so in the beginning when the narrator talks about the book they are reading and the dreamlike trance the writing seems to take on when they think about the subject matter of the book before they slip into unconsciousness. The separation of the character’s consciousness in a way that seems to distribute it over several places, causing both a disturbed and comfortable sleep in fractures I thought was described in a way that makes the reader feel empathetic towards the character whose name is not yet revealed to us. I think what stood out to me more than everything else in the text was Proust’s way of drawing the reader’s attention to things that we usually wouldn’t pay attention to otherwise. Surely, most authors would overlook the shifting of the light or the noises a character would hear in favour of the greater picture they are trying to create through their writing. It was very unusual to me, especially as authors of old literature goes- or maybe it is Proust’s way of writing that made me pay attention to something I didn’t realise I never actually noticed previously- but quite refreshing. To me, Proust seems to draw the reader into the past through dreamlike sequences of the character’s childhood before dragging them back abruptly into the present yet it is done in such a subtle, almost, dare I say, gentle way, the reader does not really understand the greater shifts between time as we are more disgruntled by the large scale exploration of the character’s psyche. Proust appears to tangle time and memory in a manner that allows organised narration to blend with chaos and it is quite interesting, if a little chaotic and has the reader caught up in quite a bit of confusion at the first look to the story.

My question would be this; what is Proust’s motive behind exploring the character’s psyche and melding time with memory the way he does in this narrative?