Within a Budding Grove: Auntie Mame: 03/11/10

I'm now up to page 480 in Within a Budding Grove. It's been another busy week for me mostly in the form of submitting resumes. Job postings seem to be picking up although the number of calls for interviews seems to be flat-lining. Since I have to be focused on finding work I haven't been as focused on Proust this week.

In this thirty page section the focus seems to be on manners and trend setting. Bloch and Robert share stories about the most outrageous people they've heard off or know. Their parents and grandparents also trade stories. It seems that everyone knows someone who knows someone.

All this talk about culture, setting trends and breaking with tradition and decorum I had two competing thoughts in my head: Lady Gaga and Auntie Mame. I decided to go with Mame because the emphasis of this passage is on people taking advantage of their position to change. I also prefer to chose fictional characters over living celebrities. Lady Gaga is a professional and a performer, whereas Mame is caricature of high society and liberal eccentricity just as the men and women in this section of Within a Budding Grove are.

See you back next week for my thoughts on pages 481-510.

Swann's Way posts:

Lisa's First Word, Baby Mine, I Sing the Body Electric, The Lady in Pink, Bleeding Gums Murphy, Caturday, Cherry Blossoms, Marge Simpson, Liana Telfer, Bender in Love, Margaret Dumont, Hyacinth Bucket, Rose, Mildred Krebs, Pepé Le Pew, Jack Harness, Cordelia Chase, Saffron, Thomas O'Malley.

Within a Budding Grove posts:

Nanowrimo, Cheers, Robert Langdon, Kif and Amy, Dead Weight, Clark Kent, Lex Luthor, Paris is a Lonely Town, And Then There's Maude, A Cafe Terrace at Night, North by Northwest, Top Hat, Chez Deetz, Ah, My Goddess!, David, Auntie Mame, Brunhilde Esterhazy, Gusteau's, Shell Beach.

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