Sodom and Gomorrah by Marcel Proust
My rating: 4/5 cats
this is the volume of ISOLT that michael bay will turn into a big budget summer blockbuster, mark my words. there are action verbs!! verbs, i tells ya!
picture this on the big screen: we open with our hero, crouching behind some flower bushes, unmoving – waiting, just waiting for a bee to come around and assist in the pollination of the flowers (pshow, whoosh – many michael-bayish essplosions) and although not strictly supported by textual evidence, i expect his little sticky hand was at the ready to relieve his straining trousers should this act of hot plant sexx occur. however – his hopes are dashed by something even sexier happening right in front of the bushes: (pshow – in the distance, an essplosion) two men begin their courtship with birdlike posturing and an involved dance of invert attraction, which they consummate nearby, to the complicated emotions of our watcher. (assplosion) WHO IS ACTUALLY A TRANSFORMER!!! zooooom! (aerosmith song)
and after that, it is like a sexy veil is lifted from the world around him and he sees that there are same-sex relations being pursued everywhere!! france is suddenly super-gay, who would have thunk it? and that is volume 4.
(also, for those of you who were concerned after the cliffhanger at the end of volume 3, where he was fretting for about 75 pages about whether he was actually invited to the party he was planning to attend regardless – spoiler alert – he WAS!!) phew. (essplosion)
it is definitely the most readable volume thus far, unless my proust-vaccine has just finally taken effect. and i think this volume works just fine as a stand-alone novel, whereas some of the others feel broken-off. this one has the humor and the bitterness for which proust is known, with fewer daydream-y bits that make you want to shake him a little, like when the concussed try to take a nap. plus, this book does not end with a whisper, like some of the other ones, but with the bang of a firm, declarative statement – ZING!!
these reviews always sound as though i am not enjoying my proust experience, which isn’t true, because i assure you, i am. sometimes it feels like my brain is passing through glue, but there are so many rewarding passages – in this volume primarily about the nature of jealousy and the way we perceive ourselves (and the way we perceive how other people perceive us ) through different “stages” of our lives that are incredibly delicate and superfine in their language.
but seriously, you people don’t need me to be reviewing proust. my function on this site is that of a literary piglet, snuffling up the truffle-books; finding the unknown and the forgotten and nudging them to the surface. having said that, i am about to start twilight, so that’s one you people might want to keep on your radar.
promises were made.
