Thoughts on Louis Aragon’s “Paris Peasant”: Tapestry of the Surreal

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Louis Aragon’s Paris Peasant is the first surrealist novel that I’ve read. While it isn’t the first surrealist work of fiction that I’ve ever experienced, shows like FLCL and films like Midsommar, and DOPE exemplify the deeply psychological and blurry narratives archetypical of surrealist fiction. However, Paris Peasant acts as a landmark of surrealist literature in that it seamlessly blends the it’s disparate structure and ideas into something cohesive and profound, which speaks to you in as many different literary languages as it possibly can.

The most immediate and striking aspect of the book is it’s unconventional structure. Aragon’s prose morphs from philosophical thesis to narrative, then to poetry and myth, looping back again in a manner that is almost dizzying. Keeping up with Aragon as he weaves his literary tapestry is at times effortful and it can often feel as though one must constantly reorient oneself so that they don’t get lost in the confusion, however when the novel is read in terms of the flow of consciousness of our narrator, many of the pieces begin falling in place.

The novel’s structure often presents vignettes of what was at the time modern life in Paris, and our narrator’s observations, perspectives, thoughts, stories, and musings are all presented as if they were flowing naturally from his consciousness. Instead of following a logical structure based on the events of a narrative, Aragon structures his work as if he was following a road with no clear destination. This isn’t to say that Paris Peasant is aimless, rather that it’s structure is one of evocation, where the events of daily life beget ideas that then influence one’s observations in a cyclical manner. The novel is composed primarily of vignettes, not necessarily narrative vignettes but rather sections that flow from one to another based entirely on our narrator’s whims and momentary interests. It is in one hand a character study, while also being an exploration of modern life and of the nature of grander ideas like God, truth and error, and time.

These ideas are explored through the direct opinions of the narrator, but are also commonly expressed through extended metaphors and similes, comparing the eccentricities of man to a garden, seeing the “blondness” in everything, and composing a script in which one’s senses are wary of imagination, who reveals to the reader that it is through his power that the greater part of human life is contingent on. All of these elements are stitched together by the curious wanderings of our narrator’s mind, a verbal manifestation of their unconscious that is not unlike the Freudian theorists, who theories the heart of one’s mind lies in their subconscious.

I find writing fiction in this style can fall prey to issues of alienating one’s audience if they are not hooked by the ideas being presented. In my opinion, Paris Peasant is a towering achievement of surrealism that captures what I find so engaging about the style perfectly. Namely, the bittersweet feeling they evoke. Often reading Paris Peasant felt laborious like I had to constantly pick it apart or that things did not often make sense, however it is this very tension, in which one must construct meaning from the text, or discard meaning and embrace abstraction for its own sake, that makes good surrealism so engaging. FLCL, which I mentioned earlier is one of my favorite pieces of fiction of all time, and I can see much of it’s structure and ideas, principally the physical manifestation of subconscious ideas and understandings, being spearheaded in this groundbreaking work. While I know I likely did not fully take in everything the novel had to offer, in my opinion that is part of the fun and what a joy Paris Peasant was for that reason.

My question to readers is whether or not they resonated with the unconventional structure of Aragon’s prose? did the lack of clear narrative logic alienate or entice you?

Thoughts on Marcel Proust’s “Combray”: Dreams of Art and Meaning

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Upon completing the “Combray” section of Proust’s groundbreaking story “In Search of Lost Time” I am struck with a feeling I would assume many modernist writings would have reveled, namely, the fact that Proust’s work elicits a feeling of both familiarity and confusion, an almost paradoxical joy and unease that in a way represent the mantra of many pieces of modernist art.

Part of this is due to the structure and style of Proust’s writing. Proust’s prose sings in a way that makes even the most benign elements of the story feel herculean in their various meanings, interpretations, and representations. Proust blends similes, metaphors, allusions, and vivid descriptions into his work in a way that makes the narrator’s remembrances of Combray feel dreamlike. This is apt as it serves the narrative of the narrator’s memory being fragmented and dreamlike, as many experiences in the narrative are recounted almost like vignettes or remembrances that are coloured in a way that is at once familiar while also brimming with nuance and embellishment on the part of the narrator. In a way, this serves the narrative beautifully, as the embellished prose in simple descriptions of a kiss goodnight or a drink of tea serve to illustrate how the memory and perspective of our narrator is what decides the meaning of events and constructs what we the readers perceive as well

I found that this fragmentation of the narrative contributed to a sense of uneasiness in me as the narrative structure is incredibly different from modern novels or the genre fiction I’ve grown accustomed to. The text, as beautifully written as it is, can still seem to meander about as our narrator recounts events and places past through long tangents that build the world we’re inhabiting, while slowing the plot’s pacing to a crawl. This pacing does contribute to the fragmentary nature of the narrative, as the moments deemed meaningful by the narrator are given incredible weight through their length of description, while the narrator notes that all that isn’t recounted is easily destroyed.

This interplay between perspective and perception, to me, forms the heart of Proust’s work here. The narrator’s struggle to hang onto fleeting memories, all the while deriving meaning in the ways art and love may accentuate the mundane, fuel a sense of beauty in perception that I perceived from the story. Combray’s narrator, thrown into various recollections through the unknowing emulation of past events, creates a tapestry of events in which the beauty and meaning of life is seen as both monumental and fleeting. In a way my feelings towards this work are perfectly captured by the modernist ideal of making things new. The narrator, in his recollections of the past, uncovers the beauty of reading with his mother and in observing the lives of others. In a similar vain, I uncovered in my reading of part of Proust’s magnum opus, both a deeper understanding of the power of perspective as well as the ways representation can shape what we see, how we see it, and what it means to us.

A question I have for discussion would be in what ways do our perceptions and memories actively shape the way we understand the world around us? How can small, seemingly inconsequential moments elicit deep emotion?

My Class Introduction

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Hello everyone in RMST 202!

My name is Lucas Ribeiro, I’m a third year psychology student who was born in raised in Vancouver. I am incredibly excited to take part in this exciting course and hopefully to read some great novels and novellas. I suppose I could write a list of hobbies but I’m very scattershot in terms of the things I’m interested, but generally I would say I’m a fan of stories (novels, films, television, etc.), music, tasty food, and everything else most people would say they are interested in.

Part of my excitement from this course comes from the fact that I am Portuguese ethnically. I am a child of immigrants and have been deeply immersed in Vancouver’s Portuguese culture my entire life. I also speak Portuguese, though I wouldn’t call myself fluent, and my curiosity and love of the language is what led to my interest in this course. Learning about individual’s whose languages sound similar to my own, while also learning about the distinct differences present in narratives written in each is fascinating for me as they may reveal some similarities and differences in the cultures that are commonly said to have a common linguistic and cultural ancestor, The Romans and the Latin tongue. More than anything however, I am excited to immerse myself in literature from parts of the world that I am less familiar with, at least in terms of their literary tradition. In particular, Latin American author’s are a bit of a blind spot for me as I do not have extensive experience with books from that region. I’m incredibly excited to get the change to better familiarize myself with a breadth of stories and writings, and hopefully I will enjoy being able to read many novels for a class.

I am also very much a fan of the perspective on romance languages as the “bastard” offspring of Latin. I know relatively well that centuries ago in Portugal, there was push back from aristocrats on adopting the “vulgar” Latin spoken by the common people as an official language of the kingdom, and that the adoption of what came to be known as Portuguese was one of steady cultural evolution and in a way, as a sign of progression from the Roman ancestors. In a way, the evolution of the Portuguese language was a way of establishing Portuguese identity, and this evolution of identity of the various languages spawned from Latin, as well as the dialects, accents, and regional variations that came from these languages, also inform the identities of those that speak them. I am incredibly excited to see if these evolving linguistic identities shine through in the readings, and am overall very excited for this course

I cannot wait to learn more,

Lucas.