Swann's Way: Swann in Love: Saffron: 10/30/09
I'm on my 18th week of reading Swann's Way (Du côté de chez Swann). I'm up to page 540. In two more weeks, I will have finished this book!

The first volume of The Search for Lost Time is wrapping up. Things between Charles Swann and Odette are coming to a head. Swann's getting suspicious of Odette's intentions, her past and her baser desires. What Swann doesn't want to admit to himself (or anyone else, although they probably already know it) is that Odette is his equal in every way, for the good and the bad. She may even best him if he's not careful.

Love, sentimentality and pig-headedness on Swann's part and luck, good acting and perhaps years of running cons has given Odette a slight upper hand. Perhaps with the recent Halloween Castle episode, my mind was primed for this week's comparison. Through most of these thirty pages, I couldn't help but think of Saffron as first introduced in "Our Mrs. Reynolds" on Firefly.

So far Odette doesn't seem quite as bad or quite as scheming as Saffron (or whatever her name really is) but her history is cagey enough and her behavior coy enough that she might be pulling an excellent con on more than just Swann.

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, Liana Telfer, Bender in Love, Margaret Dumont, Hyacinth Bucket, Rose, Mildred Krebs, Pepé Le Pew, Jack Harness, Cordelia Chase.

books | fiction | Marcel Proust | 1913

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