# Summarize Proust!! **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [April 20, 2002, 6:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/summarize-proust/104649 "2002-04-20T06:51:27Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 5\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [April 20, 2002, 6:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/summarize-proust/104649/1 "2002-04-20T06:51:27Z")
I confess I do not know much about the writer. Was he really in his time hailed as brilliant? OTOH, I have seen reports that he was considered unreadable. His big _Remembrance of Things Past_ was published in volumes with titles like _Sodom and Gomorra, Sodom and Gomorra II_. (And you thought Hollywood was first in creating improbable sequels!!) All the way to _Le Temps retrouvé_ volume published posthumously in 1927. Was it true this was his only novel? Or is he the most famous novelist to never finish one? I am looking to be enlightened. [sub]Or skip everything and give the award to this contest to the girl with the biggest tits. 🙂 (Hey! Don’t blame me! That was how the Pythons ended the original contest!! I wanted also to get ahead of the silliness this tread will produce! I know you guys!) [/sub] 😛 ---
**Author:** ![bonzer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/45deac/32.png) [@bonzer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bonzer)\ **Post date:** [April 20, 2002, 10:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/summarize-proust/104649/2 "2002-04-20T10:56:38Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by GIGObuster \* > His big _Remembrance of Things Past_ … Reclusive invalid has tea and cake, which allows him to remember (at some length) how every woman he ever loved is either dead and/or a lesbian. Realises everybody is getting old. The end. More seriously, Pinter’s _The Proust Screenplay_ is a surprisingly decent stab at reducing it all to just plot for the purposes of an two hour long film (never made, though the script was recently staged by the National Theatre in London). > [@](#): > > Was it true this was his only novel? There is _Jean Santeuil_, but it’s usually regarded as an abandoned first stab at The Big One. Most of his other writings, including much of the criticism, is similarly semi-autobiographical stuff that works its way into the novel. [sub]My guess for the girl with the biggest tits would be Gilberte. ;)[/sub] ---
**Author:** ![mobo85](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/b19c9b/32.png) [@mobo85](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mobo85)\ **Post date:** [April 20, 2002, 1:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/summarize-proust/104649/3 "2002-04-20T13:16:02Z")
Proust, in his first book wrote about, wrote about… (ding!) Start again. (looney appears) ---
**Author:** ![Creaky](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/e68b1a/32.png) [@Creaky](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Creaky)\ **Post date:** [April 20, 2002, 5:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/summarize-proust/104649/4 "2002-04-20T17:03:16Z")
Yeah, something about a cookie. Whenever I hear “Proust”, I think, “cookie”. I seem to remember it was actually a madeleine cookie. That’s all I remember. Maybe I should eat a cookie so I can remember more. ---
**Author:** ![Briny\_Deep](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/briny_deep/32/17188_2.png) [@Briny\_Deep](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Briny_Deep)\ **Post date:** [April 21, 2002, 1:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/summarize-proust/104649/5 "2002-04-21T01:58:00Z")
I direct your attention to Monty Python’s [All-England Summarize Proust Competition](http://www.montypython.net/scripts/proust.php), alluded to by **mobo85**.