Proustiennes follows Erik Satie’s Gnossiennes–brief, deft explorations of a theme. Jean Fremon traces Marcel Proust’s influence through hawthorns, soirees, and clairvoyance to attitudes on closure, bringing the fin-de-siecle world of Paris’s belle epoque into conversation with today.

From Other and Same:

Was it because, having already seen white hawthorn, the sight of a pink hawthorn with blossoms that were multiple rather than singular gave him the simultaneous sense of analogy and difference, both of which have so much power over our minds? wonders Jean Santeuil, looking for a reason for why he prefers the pink hawthorn to every other flower.

…

Between these two poles, stretched tight, is fiction. Musil’s narrative framework is a net under the feet of that aerialist of thought who successively lets go and grabs hold of the notions which, like heaven-sent trapezes, present themselves to him one after the other, while he measures with irony the gulf that separates the past moment from the future one.

census of eventualities general examination of possibilities

Jean Fremon is the author of over twenty works of poetry, fiction, and essay. The Island of the Dead won the 2004 PEN USA Award in Literary Translation. He lives and works in Paris.

A three-time winner of the O. Henry Prize, Brian Evenson is the author of Last Days, which won the ALA award for Best Horror Novel of 2009. He teaches at Cal Arts.