Book review

Citation

Coleman, J. (2003), "Book review", European Business Review, Vol. 15 No. 5. https://doi.org/10.1108/ebr.2003.05415eab.005

Book review

Proust as Interpreter of Ruskin

Cynthia GambleSummaBirmingham, AL200210.1108/09555340310493090

I am perhaps ill-fitted for the task of reviewing this book. I know little about Proust and it is a long time since I read John Ruskin's books, but I did read most of them and they left an indelible impression on me. Dr Gamble's book is a work of devoted scholarship and although I feel it is mainly a work for her fellow Ruskin scholars, it does also contain much that is fascinating for a butterfly-minded generalist like myself. Certainly the relationship of Proust's work and the books of Ruskin is a fascinating subject in itself, almost as interesting as the enigmatic relations between the English and French nations. It did not seem to me at all strange that Marcel Proust started with the Bible of Amiens as his first translation, Amiens being a town even then within easy reach of Paris. What better way of reaching the hearts of the French people whom Proust wanted to influence? Is that not what every young artist or writer wants to do without compromising his/her own visions?

I think one of the most lasting memories that Ruskin imprinted on my mind was his description of an archway, which he said you could look at forever. For Ruskin art was not just a nice extra you could add on but a practical quality that would make the objects you have to look at every day in this world bearable eternally without driving you mad or making you wretched.

In my mind Ruskin was no more an art critic primarily than his friend Anthony Froude was primarily an historian, who after some years of examining the sixteenth century records in Spain to write his history of the Tudor Period, wrote a letter from Valladolid: "the value of the documents here lies less in the facts they contain than in the insight which they give into the secret passions and motives of the great actors in European history". I think I am not wrong in making this comparison.

In one letter Ruskin wrote to Froude he said: "you have taught me, more beautifully than any other Englishman I ever read except Shakespeare and Chaucer, what an Englishman is … ". I include these points only because I think they provide a clue to understanding both these men and I suspect that it is that insight into "the secret passions and motives" that led Marcel Proust to John Ruskin for so much of his inspiration. At any rate that thought seemed to be going through my mind again and again as I read Cynthia Gamble's book. Indeed it seemed to me the explanation of the "miracle" of Proust's translation when he had studied English for so short a time. It was indeed a kind of "writing in tongues". The inspiration he experiences was itself the reason for finding the right words in French. Is it really surprising?

John ColemanJoint Editor of New European