Moncrieff: 265-277; Grieve: 193-202
by Dennis Abrams
Mme Swann’s fashion choices, choices which seem to draw upon past styles. “She need only ‘hold out’ like this for a little longer and young men attempting to understand her theory of dress would say: ‘Mme Swann is quite a period in herself, isn’t she?’” “And now and then in the blue velvet of the bodice a hint of ‘slashes,’ in the Henri II style, or in the gown of black satin a slight swelling which, if it was in the sleeves, just below the shoulders, made one think of the ‘leg of mutton’ sleeves of 1830, or if, on the other hand, it was beneath the skirt, of Louis XV ‘panniers,’ gave the dress a just perceptible air of being a ‘fancy dress’ costume and at all events, by insinuating beneath the life of the present day a vague reminiscence of the past, blended with the person of Mme Swann the charm of certain heroines of history or romance. And if I were to draw her attention to this: ‘I don’t play golf,’ she would answer, ‘like so many of my friends. So I should have no excuse for going about in sweaters as they do.’” Marcel makes a sudden decision to start again with Gilberte, but only as her lover. Marcel, in order to “for a whole year…smother Gilberte in roses and lilac,” sells his aunt Leonie’s old Chinese vase. En route to the Swann’s, Marcel “thought I saw, close to the Swanns’ house but going in the other direction, away from it, Gilberte, who was walking slowly, though with a firm step, by the side of a young man with whom she was conversing and whose face I could not distinguish.” Arriving at the Swann’s and finding Gilberte not at home, Marcel leaves in search of her, but could not find her. “But if I had not called there, if the carriage had not taken the Avenue des Champs-Elysees, I should not have seen Gilberte with that young man. Thus a single action may have two contradictory effects, the the misfortune that it engenders cancel the good fortune it had brought one.” Marcel decides that happiness can never be achieved, and spends the 10,000 francs from the sale of Leonie’s vase “to drown my sorrows in the arms of women whom I did not love.” Marcel refuses all invitations, including a dinner at which the Bontemps “were to be present with their niece Albertine…So it is that the different period of our lives overlap one another. We scornfully decline, because of one whom we love and who will some day be of so little account, to see another who is of no account today, whom we shall love tomorrow, whom we might, perhaps, had we consented to see her now, have loved a little sooner and who would thus have put an end to our present sufferings, bring others, it is true, in their place.”
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Amazing. I apologize for including so many lengthy quotes in the synopsis, but…this is a remarkable section.
For me, the key paragraph:
“We desire some pleasure, and the material means of obtaining it are lacking. ‘It is sad,’ La Bruyere tells us, ‘to love without an ample fortune.’ there is nothing for it but to try to eradicate little by little our desire for that pleasure. In my case, however, the material means had been forthcoming, but at the same moment, if not by a logical effect, at any rate as a fortuitious consequence of that initial success, my pleasure had been snatched from me. As, for that matter, it seems as though it must always be. As a rule, however, not on the same evening as we have acquired what makes it possible. Usually, we continue to struggle and hope for a little longer. But happiness can never be achieved.”
Once again, I think, we witness Proust moving, in the span of just a few sentence sentences (why, do you think, the sudden use of short, almost terse sentences) from dry ironic humor “As a rule, however, not on the same evening as we have acquired what makes it possible,” to complete surrender, “But happiness can never be achieved.”
My question is this: Who is it who is thinking that “happiness can never be achieved?” Is it the teenage Marcel, now finally defeated in his love for Gilberte? Or, is it the narrator, looking back at Marcel’s loss?
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And, finally, an excerpt from Andre Maurois’ book, Proust: Portrait of a Genius and a glimpse at Proust’s relationship with the courtesan Laure Hayman, the inspiration, at least in part, for Odette.
“Laure Hayman, ‘that strange courtesan colored with preciosity,’ doted on the young Proust, took him with her everywhere and called him ‘Mon Petit Marcel‘ or ‘Mon petit Saxe psychologique.’ When Paul Bourget made her the heroine of his novel, Gladys Harvey, she gave Marcel a copy, bound in the flowered silk from one of her own petticoats. He asked her to tell Bourget how much he admired the book, and Bourget replied as follows:
‘This young Marcel of yours — this Saxe psychologique, as you call him — must be a really delightful creature, if I can judge of him from the letter which you so very graciously sent me. His comment on the passage in Gladys referring to Jacques Molon, proves that he has a mind which is capable of thinking about what he reads, and his enthusiasm warms my heart. Please tell him that I look forward to having the great pleasure of meeting him as soon as I have finished the piece of work to which I am at present harnessed. His father gave him three pieces of advice, and you a forth. To these I am going to add a fifth: never to let his love for letters did. A time will come when he will no longer love my books, because at present he loves them to excess. {Author’s Note: Sound familiar?} Claude Larcher knows only too well that when one loves too much, one is on the point of ceasing to love at all. But let him never cease loving that beauty of art at which he guesses, and for which he seeks through the medium of my unworthy self…’
Maurois continues:
“What a very strange young man he must have been at that time! Like the Narrator of his own novel, he seems to have been of no specific age. Are we to think of him as a child or as an adolescent? Impossible to tell. “
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The Weekend’s Reading:
Moncrieff: Page 278 “During those periods…” through Page 298 “…the coloured shade of a wistaria bower.”
Grieve: Page 202 “During these periods…” through Page 217 “…in the pale glow of an arbor of wisteria.”
This weekend, we will finish reading “Madame Swann at Home” (or “At Mme Swann’s” if you’re reading the Grieve translation), before beginning “Place Names: The Place” and journeying on to Balbec next week.
Please, share with the group what you’re thinking as we finish this section, and share with me your thoughts on how I can improve the blog and the experience of reading Proust for you.
Enjoy your reading, and enjoy your weekend.
Fascinated by the notion of a person taking their final form at a certain age, as Odette has. And in her final shape and style she appears younger! And her character and confidence have also taken shape, although to some observers she represents a certain period which has passed, although they recognize she has a style of her own. Much earlier the narrator referred to her as one of the most stylish women in Paris.
With the elaborate dresses and accessories in which she maintains herself, I imagine an army of seamstresses and fabric purveyors busy on her behalf. Fortunes must have been spent on her wardrobe. I loved the descriptions of her outfits, think this is Proust at his best.
And then Marcel sinks back into his tiresome neurotic amorous obsessions and I find myself just turning the pages again. Today he reminded me of a friend you meet from time to time for coffee, who will bore you for an hour with a blow by blow recap of a love affair that has been over for years, and you pretend to listen and try to get him to talk about something else, and remember why it is that you seldom get together.
Dennis, you are doing a great job!
Critic Michael Dirda wrote that “To those who respond to his sinuous prose – and many people don’t – there is no more powerful hypnotic drug in all literature.” A quote from you, Dennis. This is how I feel about the experience of reading Proust. I feel intoxicated by this world I have entered. However, I tried two or three times before to enter that world and only through this project have I succeeded. I am grateful beyond words to you, Dennis, for what you have crafted and generously given.
My perception of memory and the past is different. I wrote about this earlier. I do wish others would post their personal experiences. If there is one thing that would improve this blog for me, it would be that more people post about their own experience.
I liked your October post, Dennis, on other books to read. I especially benefited from his housekeeper’s memoir and Patrick Alexander’s guide. Would like to have additional recommendations.
I knew more about Proust before I started the novel than I knew about other writers. Usually a writer’s personal life doesn’t interest me–his or her books say it all. With Proust it is different. But sometimes I wonder if knowing about his life is a good thing or not. It doesn’t matter because I’m hooked on that too.
March Hare:
I’m glad you’re enjoying the experience. I, too, wish that others (and you know who you are out there!) would start to share their experiences as well.
Here a couple of other recommendations:
Maurois: Proust: A Portrait of a Genius
and
Richard Davenport-Hines: Proust at the Majestic: The Last Days of the Author Whose Book Changed Paris.
This last one is a fascinating look at Proust’s last days (obviously), including one of his last appearances in public: at a party held by English art lovers Violet and Sidney Schiff at the Hotel Majestic, a party whose other guests included Igor Stravinsky, Serge Diaghilev, Pablo Picasso, and James Joyce.
I’ve just installed new bookcases in my study and I devoted a shelf to Proust with many of the books Dennis has recommended. I can’t tell you how much pleasure it’s given me to stand in front of the shelf, pull out a book, browse through it, and feel even more connected to the project we’re all on.
I am really drawn to Proust’s statements about love:
“This explains why every new pain that a woman inflicts on us (which she often does without meaning to) increases not only her power over us, but also the demands we make on her.”
“For in love, unlike war, the more one is defeated, the more one imposes harsh conditions; and one constantly tries to make them harsher – if one is actually in a position to impose any, that is.” (Grieve, p. 200-201)
Many of these statements scream to me from the page. I don’t know how to put them all together to say something about the author, but they definitely make me want to keep reading and looking for more of these insights.