{"id":6,"date":"2026-01-11T20:51:14","date_gmt":"2026-01-12T03:51:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/tripteasthoughts\/?p=6"},"modified":"2026-01-11T20:51:14","modified_gmt":"2026-01-12T03:51:14","slug":"multiple-perspectives-proust","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/tripteasthoughts\/2026\/01\/11\/multiple-perspectives-proust\/","title":{"rendered":"Multiple Perspectives – Proust"},"content":{"rendered":"

Hi all!<\/p>\n

To be honest, reading Proust, I definitely got lost sometimes due so I\u2019d re-read the sentences quite often. Again, that might be just because I haven\u2019t read something like this in a while. One thing that stood out to me is the way the narrator describes the character\u2019s fascination with the architecture and natural landscape in and around Combray, perhaps giving a sense of Proust\u2019s own interest or fascination with art. Whether that may be that he himself is an artist or collects art. Many of the descriptions the narrator has made seem to show Proust’s deep understanding of art, his attention to detail, how his writing and art seem to have some sort of relationship – or at least it\u2019s something I wonder and am assuming.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

While the descriptions were detailed, reading this, I also sensed a theme connected to time and nostalgia, perhaps. For example, when Proust describes being pulled back into time to Combray just from tasting the cake dipped into the tea. This gave an illustration of how Proust may relate the two things and shows his understanding of the intersection between time and nostalgia. I think something we all can relate to – associating things or moments with a certain time. It seems as if a lot of what Proust has written about are things he may recall, experiences he had, like old days at Combray, his hopes, his fears, such as losing his sense of time, and his relationships, such that he has with his mother, the comfort she provides him through her goodnight kisses.<\/span><\/p>\n

Another reason that makes me think that a lot of this reflects his own life is the section where he talks about the \u2018magic lantern\u2019, which projects pictures from children\u2019s stories onto the bedroom walls. In my understanding, without any explanation, calling something a magic lantern can be truly subjective; I would think completely different and say it sings songs to you or is just a light that is always present, familiar to me through my childhood. That\u2019s why this detailed description that Proust provides makes me think that a lot of it is Proust\u2019s life, but through a different character. Additionally, the way the narrator has mentioned this routine of the goodnight kisses also gives us a sense of habit or structure or routine, whichever you want to call it, and how it\u2019s something the character is so used to that straying away from it creates difficulty. Reading many Psychology books and just thinking from my perspective and experiences, we often don\u2019t like the feeling of fear or change, it\u2019s two very common feelings that we try to avoid, and some of us, when possible, want to stick to that or have the solutions that immediately solve it for us. In a sense, it is something all of us humans relate to, so as much as I may have felt lost sometimes, there were moments where I would make sense of what is being said and understand the feeling that is being conveyed – really tapping into this component of the novel that the readers as humans could relate to.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

So after reading this, something I\u2019m keen on discussing in class is, depending on how much of the text we understood, especially if you didn’t necessarily understand each line like me, as humans did some of us still relate to these common themes of time and nostalgia or fearing losing structure or the habit?<\/span><\/p>\n

I\u2019d love to hear your thoughts!<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Hi all! To be honest, reading Proust, I definitely got lost sometimes due so I\u2019d re-read the sentences quite often. Again, that might be just because I haven\u2019t read something like this in a while. One thing that stood out to me is the way the narrator describes the character\u2019s fascination with the architecture and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":94353,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5,6,4,3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-family","category-memory","category-narration","category-proust"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/tripteasthoughts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/tripteasthoughts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/tripteasthoughts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/tripteasthoughts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/94353"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/tripteasthoughts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/tripteasthoughts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/tripteasthoughts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6\/revisions\/7"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/tripteasthoughts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/tripteasthoughts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/tripteasthoughts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}