Reject du jour: Proust’s “Freebird”
(Click on the image for a larger size.) Image: carolita johnson
Well, I can’t complain, I’ve nearly finished unpacking—just one room left to clear before getting down to painting—I’ve sold a cartoon today, I have a cartoon published in The New Yorker this week (yay!), and I’m eating my dinner as I type this, thus combining two of my favorite activities: eating and writing.
First, the reject. It’s a cartoon I’ve been meaning to do for at least a year, since the last time (or should I say, “umpteenth” time?) someone managed to squeeze a mention of Proust’s madeleine into their writing. (If I had a penny! Or better yet, a madeleine!) I imagined poor Proust, turning in his grave every time someone refered to that madeleine. I imagine him snarling, “Why, why, why did I ever write about that saloperie de madeleine,” as he gnashes his teeth. Whenever someone wants to put a highbrow touch to their literary laziness, they get out a can of madeleine. I’m all for handing out tickets with fines. The madeleine has become literature’s “Freebird.”
Play “Freebird,” Marcel!
As for the published cartoon, here it is! It’s the result of considering a frequently heard question that I’ve always thought was very very silly to ask. After all, you really are only expecting one answer to that question when you ask it. The answer that you really don’t want to hear, I mean. Why ask, when accusations serve one so much better?
October 15th, 2006 at 2:46 am
I seen it
Page 134. But I like the Proust better.
This is related to your article on Google ads: When I get a new New Yorker, I spend the first fifteen minutes riping out advertisements. They make a good foundation for a woodstove fire.
October 15th, 2006 at 12:00 pm
I do exactly the same thing! I rip out all those stiff ads, but realized that keeping one as a bookmark is actually very handy!
I once did a cartoon about a newstand guy offering magazines with the ads pre-removed for an extra 25 cents! Maybe I’ll put it up next week.
Been very sporadic with the posting lately, still unpacking, spackling, filling holes, doing the DIY repairs, and I have yet to paint the place to get rid of the tobacco-stained look of it all… Nice to see I still have a reader or two!
October 17th, 2006 at 10:07 pm
I read your blog. I just don’t know enough about Proust to make an intelligent comment. Nice gag about “affairs”.
Dave
October 17th, 2006 at 10:34 pm
the m-word. hysterical.
October 18th, 2006 at 1:40 am
Ah, well, the one thing, Dave, that you need to know about Proust is that he once got nostalgic about the madeleine. Ever since, any literary person trying to refer to the powers of food to bring on vivid, compelling memories feels obliged to bring up that famous passage about the madeleine. It gives one such an air of cultivation to bring up Proust, rather than, say, a Scooby-snack. But I consider it cheating.
October 18th, 2006 at 4:18 am
There was a funny bit on “The Sopranos” about Proust and the madeleines. That’s all I know about it , too. But I know even less about affairs.