Within a Budding Grove

Remembrance of Things Past is one of the monuments of twentieth-century literature. Neville Jason’s unabridged recording of the work runs to 150 hours. Within a Budding Grove is the second of seven volumes. The theme is one of developing sexuality. In the story, the narrator visits a brothel, and we follow the course of his first love affair with Gilberte. When he visits the seaside resort of Balbec and meets “the little band” of enchanting adolescent girls, he finds one of them, Albertine, especially intriguing but doesn’t yet realize how much she will mean to him in the future. This edition is based on the translation by C. K. Scott Moncrieff.