Swann's Way: Combray: Liana Telfer: 08/28/09
I'm on my 9th week of reading Swann's Way (Du côté de chez Swann). I cut my usual thirty pages a week short by five pages this week as the first section of Swann's Way ends on page 265.

These final twenty five pages are a look the Duchess of Guermentes and her family's long history. Marcel has grand ideas of how she will be and is disillusioned when he sees her in person.

The mixture of history, Gothic architexture and character study made me think of the character progression of Liana Telfer in The Ninth Gate (1999). She is first an alluring rival for Corso, to a potentially dangerous foe, to being the leader of a huge Satanic cult in her ancestral manor to ultimately being an easily defeated red herring. Her rise and fall is quick and unexpected.

As we're just shy of the half way point, there is time for the Duchess of Guermentes to evolve as a character. Next week I start the section called "Swann in Love."

Previous posts: Lisa's First Word, Baby Mine, I Sing the Body Electric, The Lady in Pink, Bleeding Gums Murphy, Caturday, Cherry Blossoms, Marge Simpson.

books | fiction | Marcel Proust | 1913

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