tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3383938214852108244.post4104719773340126052..comments2024-03-29T03:04:00.853-05:00Comments on Wuthering <br>Expectations: Some favorite bits of Nausea - Enjoying the ignoble marmeladeAmateur Reader (Tom)http://www.blogger.com/profile/13675275555757408496noreply@blogger.comBlogger7125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3383938214852108244.post-45227569239329258442018-11-01T14:47:55.815-05:002018-11-01T14:47:55.815-05:00It's a great joke. The character, the Autodid...It's a great joke. The character, the Autodidact, my brother, is in the "L"s when the narrator meets him.<br /><br />Except it made me wonder how exactly the library in Le Havre was organized in the 1920s. Everything alphabetical, regardless of subject?Amateur Reader (Tom)https://www.blogger.com/profile/13675275555757408496noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3383938214852108244.post-37245856049247425322018-11-01T12:00:19.540-05:002018-11-01T12:00:19.540-05:00The only thing I actually remember from this book ...The only thing I actually remember from this book is the character who's reading all the major French authors alphabetically. I think there's at least one enjoyable joke where the narrator mockingly references something he knows the guy hasn't quite gotten to in his reading.dollymixnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3383938214852108244.post-36034512941436700752018-10-15T08:42:39.494-05:002018-10-15T08:42:39.494-05:00How reassuring, or kind, since "pudding"...How reassuring, or kind, since "pudding" was a bit of a joke, although almost every choice available is hilarious. I mean, "despicable mush," that's funny.<br /><br />I think I like "mush" best because it keeps the texture and sense that there is food involved somehow, but loses the orange peel, which is what "marmelade" means to me.<br /><br />You will see it in Kermode, another trip back in time, when Sartre, and this novel, in particular, was taken so, so seriously. Authentic historical detail.Amateur Reader (Tom)https://www.blogger.com/profile/13675275555757408496noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3383938214852108244.post-82311006923252803812018-10-15T07:35:09.793-05:002018-10-15T07:35:09.793-05:00I agree that marmelade is not pudding, but it'...I agree that <i>marmelade</i> is not pudding, but it's not really marmelade either; marmelade is only one kind of <i>marmelade</i>. I'd render it "compote," "mush," or (taking it in a figurative sense) "mess."<br /><br />I've never been able to take Sartre seriously -- at least, not as seriously as he expected/demanded -- and that Existential Comics link isn't helping.Languagehathttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13285708503881129380noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3383938214852108244.post-56595664927389245662018-10-13T12:30:47.751-05:002018-10-13T12:30:47.751-05:00Now I feel I have to reread this book. I'm imp...Now I feel I have to reread this book. I'm impressed by your capturing <i>Nausea</i> obliquely by beginning your conclusion with a promised focus on Sunday in a French city and ending it with a row of dead rats in a window.<br /><br />Since you asked and if I may, I think your translations do the job admirably with the single exception of the word "pudding," a concoction most French people I know would recoil from in horror (maybe that was the intention - such a "Naked Lunch" line). "Marmelade" is the same in French and English and might have been left as is. <br /><br /><br /><br />seraillonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17654593356535433945noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3383938214852108244.post-33031932676196296792018-10-12T11:44:28.046-05:002018-10-12T11:44:28.046-05:00A stronger way of saying this is that I found a po...A stronger way of saying this is that I found a point where I abandoned the idea that <i>Nausea</i> had a special status as a philosophical novel, that it was any more philosophical than <i>The Good Soldier</i> or <i>The Tin Drum</i>. No less philosophical, but no more. I would call <i>The Moviegoer</i> a philosophical novel, so I am not dismissing the idea.Amateur Reader (Tom)https://www.blogger.com/profile/13675275555757408496noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3383938214852108244.post-2088455179456058722018-10-11T04:09:35.253-05:002018-10-11T04:09:35.253-05:00I like your turn from the philosophical novel to l...I like your turn from the philosophical novel to looking at the protagonist as a psychological study. I do not remember reading the book like that but it seems to make sense to do so. I will ask some of my French speaking relatives how they distinguish millipedes from centipedes :)Brian Josephhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15139559400312336791noreply@blogger.com