Swann's Way

Nostalgia and run-on sentences. 
Recollections of a sad, anxious boy, his memories and accounts of people, often miserable, that he grew up around, scandals that are only scandals due to the attitudes of the time. Very little of the protagonist emerges amongst detailed descriptions of the scenery (nature and architecture), a few books, even place names, aside from his ambition to become a writer and the start of one love affair, which is linked into the large digression regarding the character of Swann, not the narrator, but arguably the protagonist for half the book. 
 Swann in Love is less a description of that 200 pages and more of a warning.  All the ways he looked down on and manipulated Odette, then Odette seemingly turns the tables or Swann buys his own con and it devolvs into toxic Chasing Amy vibes because of her reputation only for her to show up later married to him.
Proust can turn a phrase, whether it's in service of evocative imagery or a scathing insult from a society dame, but there's something overall that's not just whistful in tone but feels actively self-defeating. Not as clear cut as pessimism or cynicism, maybe just depression manifesting? Maybe this is just what it was to be this type of person in this era. I'm not inspired to pick up the next volume, even considering, or perhaps because of, the way this one ended. 

⚠️ antisemitism, classism, homophobia