Mama's boy
Well that was something, wasn’t it. I remember discussing how literature sometimes makes us feel stupid. And boy was I lost in those words. The first ten pages feel like a fever dream where there was a bunch of random things happening without knowing what’s going on. It took me awhile to grasp what he was talking about. I had to reread some paragraph just because I lost the point of discussion by the time I reach the bottom of the page. The beginning feel like endless amount of run-on sentences about how he sleeps and how his sleeping location reminds him of his childhood home.
Then things was a little odd for a little while. How he was reminiscing about his obsession with a goodnight kiss from his mom. I mean it is healthy for a child to be demanding of affection from the parents but the fact that the narrator was preplanning where to look at his mother while she’d kiss him goodnight came off a bit strange to me. This may be a cultural difference which I may not be familiar with. The text also is written like a journal entry. It feels like he is writing down anything and everything that flow into his head about his home in Combray. But admirably, it is not without structure. At first glance it feel like an info dump but in a big picture, it is the narrator’s reminiscing of his childhood that revealed why he craved his mother’s goodnight kisses so. It did not come as a surprise that affection is rare in that house but for a little boy to experience affection for the first time from his mother when she was consoling him is an amazing scene. I understand how that boy must have felt. It isn’t that his mother doesn’t care because she showed that she does by standing there in the hallway, wiping his tears. His father also seemed cold and distant at first but when he told his wife to sleep in his son’s room to comfort him without any sign of anger or annoyance is, well a bare minimum in today’s standard but, a way of showing he cares for his family.
This entire section did a number on me. It was confusing, heart braking, a little humorous and overall an interesting read. I feel seen in that boy’s separation anxiety. Also, what’s up with not mentioning the boy’s name???
Hahaha so true about the attachment issues he has. I wrote about the same thing in mine but about my brother who was like Proust in Combray but even more crazy. He would yell constantly for my mom to give him some affection before bed or he refused to sleep. And it was terrible for me because I slept in the bunkbed above him.
ReplyDeleteThis is such as interesting interpretation especially since his memories were the most clear and not fragmented of his mother. Maybe this could be his coping mechanism abt the attachment issues he had with his mother?
ReplyDelete"It was confusing, heart braking, a little humorous and overall an interesting read. I feel seen in that boy’s separation anxiety." Perhaps that's precisely what the narrator intended. Confusion also serves a purpose, especially when we want to return to the past to understand our present. Sometimes we only have the memory of affection, and everything else surrounding it is vague.
ReplyDeleteI liked how you pointed out the different ways his parents show their affection and care for him. I honestly found his relationship with them kind of odd and confusing, but it was also... relatable. Getting through the start of the book definitely felt like a fever dream for me too - I had to reread so many parts to try and figure out what exactly was going on.
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