Katherine, my sewing mentor and bookgroup friend, has tagged me to do a meme.
1.Pick up the nearest book.
2. Open to page 123.
3. Find the fifth sentence.
4. Post the next three sentences.
5. Tag five people, and acknowledge who tagged you.
OK, here we go:
Madame de Gallardon was in a very spiteful mood because some gentlemen who were with her had thought they should bring up the subject of Oriane: “I’m not in the least anxious to see her, she had replied, I caught sight of her just now, in any case, she’s beginning to age; it seems she can’t come to terms with it. Basin himself says so. And I can well understand that, because, since she’s not intelligent, is a thoroughly nasty piece of work, and has a bad way with her, she certainly feels that, once she’s no longer beautiful, she’ll have nothing left at all.”
It’s a classic piece of Proust bitching. Most of this book, Sodom and Gomorrah consists of aristocratic French people sitting around at dinner parties, at the opera, before the theatre, etc, bitching about each other and who was invited where by whom; who no longer speaks to whom; who is in a secret gay relationship with whom. It sounds like the most boring thing that you could ever read, and I’m sure to some people it is; but I really love it.
I’m not going to blather on any more about Proust – I feel I’ve definitely done enough of that here (but if you want to have a long Proust-loving private chat please phone me up and we can talk for hours). But I do have one more thing to add: if you’re wondering when we’re going to start having children (since we’re married now it seems like everyone wants to know) it’s definitely not going to happen until I’ve read Proust VI. I’ve heard that in the first year of your child’s life it is nigh on impossible to finish reading a single book, and this is one series that I’m not going to read interrupted.
Now, all there's left to do is tag some more people to read to us from their books. I tag Claire and Mr E, Hanna and Drue and Gilbert.
5 comments:
does it have to be a novel because all i have at the moment are boring architectural texts because i'm at work : (
oohh I'll bring my book into work tomorrow and post it up for you :)
This excert is from a book by Virginia Duigan called 'Days Like These'
Susanna came in as the doctor was leaving and gave me a piercing look, flicking her eyes meaningfuly at the broad medical back disappearing down the stairs with Mim.
When they were out of earshot she said, 'That's one of the others.'
'The others?'
'The other two mothers.
In the book.
Here's my literary excerpt. Sorry for cheating a bit and not passing it on.
Ed
It's OK to cheat a bit.
It's nice to hear some little excerpts from what other people are reading. Feels like I'm being read to, which I love by the way.
Post a Comment