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Swann's Way

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Swann's Way

By: Marcel Proust
Narrated by: Neville Jason
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About this listen

Remembrance of Things Past is one of the monuments of 20th-century literature. Neville Jason’s widely praised abridged version has rightly become an audiobook landmark, and now, upon numerous requests, he is recording the whole work unabridged which, when complete, will run for some 140 hours.

Swann’s Way is the first of seven volumes and sets the scene with the narrator’s memories being famously provoked by the taste of that little cake, the madeleine, accompanied by a cup of lime-flowered tea. It is an unmatched portrait of fin-de-siècle France.

Public Domain (P)2012 Naxos AudioBooks Historical Fiction World Literature Fiction
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Proust is worth engaging with, and Swann’s Way is deserving of a place in your reading and listening list. Dealing as it does so beautifully with memory, time, art, culture, conversations and language. I saw it described as one of the greatest novels of all time so wanted to give it a go, and it was so good it overwhelmed me - the way the recollections flow and transition and link to smell and tastes and emotions - it is all done masterfully, not that Proust needed my confirmation or support.

Both my kids asked me what the podcast was I was listening to because it’s stream of consciousness and flow sounds a lot like something much more modern and current than I expected.

The narrator of this version does well to bring something of the text and characters within it to life. But the magic is also in ensuring the performance does not get in the way of the words and the mastery of words and meanings being presented.

It may take you a while to adjust to the style of what is happening but stick with it and it will transport you and connect you in with your own times of when you felt love, jealousy, longing and loneliness as described. The descriptions of art and society were amazing and brilliantly woven through the novel. Enjoy it.

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We enjoyed Neville Jason's reading of Swann's Way. The portrait of family life in Combray is brilliant. The sections about Swann are overlong.

A very long masterpiece

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The spoken word made this book accessible. And glorious. This I couldn’t find in reading. Yet. Maybe now I will retry. Onwards to volume two.

Extraordinary

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A 20th century classic and all of that, but I had no idea what it was about. Perhaps it is better for people who are really into literary styles of writing, rather than those looking for a good story which has a beginning, a middle and an end.

What was it about?

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