Proust and Emotion: The Importance of Affect in a la Recherche Du Temps Perdu

By Inge Crosman Wimmers

In Proust and Emotion, Inge Crosman Wimmers proposes a new approach to A la recherche du temps perdu that centres on the role of affect. Through close reading of the hero-narrator's personal history, the author shows how emotional paradigms (especially separation anxiety), involuntary memory, and other compelling impressions give focus and structure to Proust's novel. Drawing on reader-oriented and emotion theories, she shows how affect commands the attention of the 'motivated reader' and is crucial to the process of self-understanding for both the narrator and the reader.

This is the first extensive study in English to take fully into consideration the drafts ( esquisses) published in the new Pl iade edition of the novel, the Mauriac edition of Albertine disparue, and material from the unpublished Proust manuscripts - all of which shed further light on the importance of affect in A la recherche. Proust and Emotion will appeal to readers interested in an approach to Proust that combines insights from philosophy, psychology, and literary aesthetics and in a poetics of reading that pays particular attention to emotion.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0802087272
• ISBN13: 9780802087270
• Release Date: December 2003
• Publisher: University of Toronto Press
• Length: 320 Pages
• Weight: 1.28 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.1" x 6.8" x 8.9"
• Grade Range: Postsecondary and higher