Bryan Alistair Charles
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bryanacharles.bsky.social
Bryan Alistair Charles
@bryanacharles.bsky.social
190 followers 61 following 360 posts
Writer in midst of disorienting midlife free fall / Author of a novel, a memoir, and a book about Pavement written for 33 1/3 / Broken Hearts Are Blue guitarist / Amateur Proust scholar bryanalistaircharles.com
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bryanacharles.bsky.social
excited to continue my immersion in the Oxford #Proust. When first reading the Search in 2003 I struggled with this one, after the delicious seaside atmosphere of vol. 2, which I had greedily inhaled. Set the Search aside until 2014, & by then I was ready for Proust's vast social canvas.
THE GUERMANTES WAY. By Marcel Proust. Translated by Peter Bush and published by Oxford World's Classics.
November 12, 2025 at 8:55 PM
bryanacharles.bsky.social
At @citylightsbooks.bsky.social. A national treasure. Proust shelf features multiple translations/volumes of The Search plus related works. Including of course the new Oxford Proust, which includes @avecsesdoigts.bsky.social's gorgeous translation of vol. 2.
#Proust
#booksky
#Proustsky
A shelf of Proust's works at City Lights Bookstore, San Francisco. A shelf of Proust's works at City Lights Bookstore, San Francisco.
November 1, 2025 at 8:39 PM
bryanacharles.bsky.social
Found this lovely copy of THE LEMOINE AFFAIR, comprising Proust's pastiches of Flaubert, Balzac, etc., at Walden Pond Books, Oakland. Translated by the great Charlotte Mandell @avecsesdoigts.bsky.social & published by @melvillehouse.bsky.social
#Proust
#Proustsky
A copy of THE LEMOINE AFFAIR by Marcel Proust. Translated by Charlotte Mandell and published by Melville House.
October 28, 2025 at 4:17 PM
bryanacharles.bsky.social
Fellow Proustians, I did it, I made madeleines!
#Proust #Proustsky
Homemade madeleines. Homemade madeleines.
October 27, 2025 at 3:39 PM
bryanacharles.bsky.social
Sunbeam Wireless. Highly recommended.
A Sunbeam Wireless flip phone.
October 24, 2025 at 11:36 PM
bryanacharles.bsky.social
Saturday night stopped at Moe's 10 minutes till close and found this-- @groveatlantic.bsky.social -- I read the Beckett Trilogy circa 2012 the same way I eventually completed THE SEARCH 2 years later--10 pages every morning first thing--(p.s. love you Barney Rosset & Dick Seaver!)
#proust
#proustsky
It is a copy of PROUST by Samuel Beckett, published by Evergreen/Grove Press.
October 13, 2025 at 5:13 PM
bryanacharles.bsky.social
In today's #Proust reading there was a reference to Baudelaire's "La Chevelure," which is exactly where I left off in Les Fleurs... yesterday!
A page from TIME REGAINED that references a poem by Charles Baudelaire.
October 1, 2025 at 7:14 PM
bryanacharles.bsky.social
James Dean with cousin Markie Winslow, Park Cemetery, Fairmount IN, February 1955, photo by Dennis Stock.

Note name Cal on headstone is same as Dean’s character in EAST OF EDEN. Dean himself would be laid to rest in Park Cemetery eight months later.

8 February 1931-
30 September 1955
#filmsky
The photo shows James Dean with his cousin Markie Winslow in Park Cemetery, Fairmount IN, on February 1955. The photo was taken by Dennis Stock.
September 30, 2025 at 3:06 PM
bryanacharles.bsky.social
Last week I watched the great SYMBIOPSYCHOTAXIPLASM, by William Greaves.
Not sure I had expectations per se, but whatever I had assumed the film might be like... it was not like that at all.
Amazing. Highly recommended.
#filmsky
William Greaves, director of SYMBIOPSYCHOTAXIPLASM, in a still from the film.
September 13, 2025 at 5:56 PM
bryanacharles.bsky.social
My newest machine. Late 1950s Hermes 2000. Has a really crisp, snappy touch, much different from the 3000, and a heavy carriage shift, similar to an Olympia SM3, maybe even a touch heavier. New platen as well!
A 1957 Hermes 2000 typewriter.
September 7, 2025 at 6:28 PM
bryanacharles.bsky.social
PARIS DU TEMPS PERDU.
The photographs of Eugène Atget with text by #Proust.
Edita Lausanne, 1963
#booksky
#Proustsky
A copy of PARIS DU TEMPS PERDU. The book features the photographs of Eugène Atget alongside text by Marcel Proust.
September 7, 2025 at 5:55 PM
bryanacharles.bsky.social
Two more Moe's finds. Centennial Proust pub. 1971 w/ photos & essays (including by Philip Kolb & Anthony Powell!).

And massive edition of SWANN'S WAY pub. 1954 by The Limited Editions Club & featuring illustrations by Bernard Lamotte.

#booksky
#Proust
#Proustsky
A copy of Marcel Proust : A Centennial Volume, edited by Peter Quennell. Published in 1971. A copy of large edition of SWANN'S WAY in slipcase. Published in 1954 by The Limited Editions Club. "The Magic Lantern." By Bernard Lamotte, from the illustrated SWANN'S WAY. "Odette de Crecy." By Bernard Lamotte, from the illustrated SWANN'S WAY.
August 29, 2025 at 3:32 PM
bryanacharles.bsky.social
Founds these at the great Recycle Bookstore, San Jose CA, neither of which I know anything about. (Latter given to "me" April 1964 by Miss Jennie Lernhart.)
#Proust
#booksky
A copy of Wallace Fowlie's A READING OF PROUST. A copy of PROUST: PORTRAIT OF A GENIUS by André Maurois. Inscription inside a used copy of PROUST: PORTRAIT OF A GENIUS that reads "Given to me, April, 1964 by Miss Jennie Lernhart."
August 16, 2025 at 9:58 PM
bryanacharles.bsky.social
dear @danielsilvabooks.bsky.social, I like the feel of the Ticonderoga in my hand & on page. Also the eraser. But it is a touch too light for me. I bought a box of the black ones thinking they might be darker but no 😂 Stays sharper longer than the Blackwing though. I will keep them in rotation! ✏️📝
A sample of pencil writing on yellow pad. Question, line with arrows, and first response written with Blackwing 602. Second response written with yellow Dixon Ticonderoga no. 2. Third response written with black Ticonderoga no. 2.
August 15, 2025 at 4:35 PM
bryanacharles.bsky.social
Last night my band Broken Hearts Are Blue played its first show in 28 years in our hometown, Kalamazoo MI. Many old friends were there, some had flown in for the occasion, many I had not seen in decades. . . it was completely overwhelming. echoes of Le Bal des têtes. . . . #Proust
Broken Hearts Are Blue live at Bell's, Kalamazoo MI, 9 August 2025.
August 11, 2025 at 2:52 AM
bryanacharles.bsky.social
Dictionnaire Marcel Proust. Another birthday treat from Moe's. (Cool part is I have loads of credit there just now so it was a freebie!)

Thanks to @insearchofproust.bsky.social for the heads up!
#booksky
#Proust
Dictionnaire Marcel Proust. Madeleine entry from Dictionnaire Marcel Proust.
August 4, 2025 at 12:30 AM
bryanacharles.bsky.social
I have read this one in English but could not resist picking it up in the original French when I saw it today on birthday outing at Moe's, one of the world's great bookstores.
#Proust
#booksky
Marcel Proust biography by Jean-Yves Tadié First page of Jean-Yves Tadié's Proust biography in French.
August 2, 2025 at 11:03 PM
bryanacharles.bsky.social
This sticker on my copy of THE TALISMAN always cuts me to the bone. @stephenking.bsky.social
A copy of 2001 mass-market reissue of THE TALISMAN.
July 28, 2025 at 2:16 PM
bryanacharles.bsky.social
My zine THE CRACK-UP is now available.
Bits of poetry, dreams, cut-ups, movies--
Besotted by #Proust, haunted by 9/11.
To order a copy send $5 to:
The Crack-Up
PO Box 1512
Alameda, CA 94501
#booksky #zines #DIY
Cover of THE CRACK-UP, a zine by Bryan Alistair Charles Page 1 of THE CRACK-UP, a zine by Bryan Alistair Charles
July 18, 2025 at 3:57 PM
bryanacharles.bsky.social
Nice to see this in today's NY times. Thank you Sadie Stein.
@3313books.bsky.social
#pavements
www.nytimes.com/2025/07/14/i...
boys are dying on these streets....
Sadie Stein summer book recommendation from NY Times. Sadie Stein summer book recommendation from NY Times.
July 14, 2025 at 11:34 PM
bryanacharles.bsky.social
It is hard to imagine a more gorgeous screen couple than Jeanne Moreau and Marcello Mastroianni in La Notte. Add Monica Vitti in the second half of the picture and the scale essentially shatters.
#filmsky
Jeanne Moreau and Marcello Mastroianni in LA NOTTE. Marcello Mastroianni and Monica Vitti in LA NOTTE.
July 11, 2025 at 5:32 PM
bryanacharles.bsky.social
I made a zine THE CRACK-UP, old school, typewriters, pencil, cut ups, glue sticks...Here is page 11 w/ my kid's drawing of me in apparently very common position, lying down reading #Proust
#zines
Page from a zine called THE CRACK-UP
July 1, 2025 at 12:27 AM
bryanacharles.bsky.social
Neighbor's cat Loki has made himself a groovy little bed in our landscaping .... #caturday
A named Loki who has made a little bed in some shrubbery.
June 21, 2025 at 6:56 PM
bryanacharles.bsky.social
Surprised and delighted to find this book face out on shelf at my local indie shop days after reading about it in @nybooks.com.
#Proust
#booksky
@columbiaup.bsky.social
A copy of PROUST, A JEWISH WAY by Antoine Compagnon
June 20, 2025 at 9:48 PM
bryanacharles.bsky.social
....for good measure I also bought DÉSERTER so I could look at the French after reading @avecsesdoigts.bsky.social's masterful translation (THE DESERTERS) out now from New Directions
#booksky
A copy of DÉSERTER by Mathias Énard. Charlotte Mandell did the English translation--whose title is THE DESERTERS--for New Directions.
June 3, 2025 at 10:15 PM