Marcel Proust Meets the New Jersey Tailgater, and Survives Summary

The narrator, stuck in the Lincoln Tunnel, thinks about how each generation attacks the next. He yells at the college kids in front of him. Then, he looks around his car, wondering how many hours he's spent in it. "Marcel Proust Meets the New Jersey Tailgater, and Survives" begins with a television lecture. Proust wrote in a cork-lined room to block out all noise. Balzac had heavy curtains and wrote at night, by candlelight. The lecture is interrupted by a commercial, and the narrator, who is watching the show, realizes that his car blocks out the world, much like Proust's cork-lined room.

The narrator's mind goes back to the previous day. Travelling Route 22 in Jersey, he finds himself being tailgated. He speeds up, changes lanes, and slows...