Proust pluriel ed. by Mireille Naturel (review)

This collection of fifteen short essays celebrates the variety of work carried out by researchers associated with the Centre de recherches proustiennes. This centre was created in 1984 by Jean Milly, and appropriately the first chapter looks back on the centre’s achievements from the perspective of its founder. The volume is united by interests in materiality, memory, and place. The importance of materiality is addressed in a number of ways, including: a brief publishing history of the covers chosen for the various editions of the Recherche (innovatively presented as a dialogue between Elyane Dezon-Jones and Emily Eells); attention to Proust’s writing habits as evidenced by his cahiers (highlighted by Julie André); and Cynthia Gamble’s fascinating analysis of the importance of the material object for Proust as exemplified in his appreciation of Marie Nordlinger’s jewellery and her sculptural and enamel work. Other chapters explore the intersections of memory and place through the history of specific archives (Robert Tranchida’s narration of the establishment of the Fonds Rivière at Bourges in 2000). That such archives form the basis of important genetic and editorial work is a recurrent theme of this volume, with Danièle Gasiglia-Laster’s useful, practical guide to the multistage process of producing a critical edition, in relation to her editing of the second volume of the Recherche for Flammarion in 1987. Also linking to place and memory, Jacques Mény considers the vogue for writers’ houses which culminated in the foundation of the Fédération nationale des maisons d’écrivain et des patrimoines littéraires in 1997. Mény argues that writers’ houses ought to be a site of research as well as tourism and demonstrates with the example of Jean Giono’s house at Manosque how a writer’s personal library can provide insight into their work. While Mény focuses on Giono’s reading of Proust, Laurence Teyssandier similarly traces Colette’s memories of Proust. The wider reception history of the Recherche between 1913 and 1954 is reviewed by Tomoko B. Woo. Following Gamble’s contribution, Marie Nordlinger is the continuing focus of chapters by Edward Bizub and Yves-Michel Ergal. Bizub reprises his work on Proust and translation, while Ergal suggests that Marie Nordlinger is an implicit presence in the Recherche via the mother and Albertine. Other chapters on the representation of death in Proust (Aude Le Roux Kieken) and Proust’s response to the language of music criticism (Cécile Leblanc) further embody the volume’s titular concept of plurality. This book aptly reflects currently developing areas of work on Proust, including the ongoing transcription and publication of Proust’s drafts and interest in the changing reception of Proust’s novel over time, not to mention consideration of the fertile interdisciplinary field of literature and medicine (in Dagmar Wieser’s analysis of relations between Dubois, Sollier, and Proust). Usefully, the volume also points forwards to new avenues of research, particularly those made possible by digital technologies, as demonstrated by Yasué Kato’s description of his research into the figure of Elstir from 1984 to the present.