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By Root 832 0

of taste in literary criticism: 644–46. Profit which a writer can derive from the conversation of aristocrats: 751–56. The same people are interesting in a book and boring in life: 780. Practical men wrong to despise the pursuit of literature: IV 591. Incompleteness a characteristic of the great works of the nineteenth century; their retrospective unity; the importance of prefaces: V 207–8. Sensual pleasure helpful to literary work: 239–40. Literature and music—is literature, which analyses what we feel about life, less true than music, which recomposes it?: 503–4; unique identity underlying the works of a great writer; M’s observations on Dostoievsky, Barbey d’Aurevilly, Hardy, Tolstoy, Baudelaire: 506–13. Certain novels bring us into temporary contact with the reality of life—“the almost hypnotic suggestion of a good book”: 757–58. Discrepancy between the thoughts of author and reader; basic flaws in literary journalism: 767–72. Objections against literature raised by M’s reading of the Goncourt Journal: VI 343. Relation of literature to life: 126. Reflexions on literary creativity: 274–335; falsity of realism in literature; absurdity of popular or patriotic literature: 277–85; “the function and the task of a writer are those of a translator”: 291; aberrations of literary criticism: 294–96; “real books … the offspring not of daylight and casual talk but of darkness and silence”: 302; in literary creation, imagination and sensibility are interchangeable: 307; writing is for the writer a wholesome and necessary function comparable to exercise, sweat and baths for a man of more physical nature: 308; “a book is a huge cemetery”: 310; our passions inspire our books, and intervals of repose write them: 317; futility of trying to guess an author’s models: 317–18; a writer’s works “like the water in an artesian well”: 318; a work of literature a kind of optical instrument enabling the reader to see himself more clearly: 344–45.

The narrator and his work. M’s first efforts to express himself in writing; the impact of Bergotte: I 132–34. His desire to translate his sensations and impressions: 218–19. His wish to be a writer; despair at his lack of talent and the “nullity” of his intellect; renounces literature for ever: 243–45, 251–52. The steeples of Martinville inspire him to composition: 253–57. Norpois advocates a literary career for M: II 13, but in such terms as to make him doubly determined to renounce the idea: 31–33; his “prose poem” fails to impress Norpois: 35, who sees in it the malign influence of Bergotte: 60–63 (cf. III 298–99). Bergotte restores his confidence: 196–97. Inability to settle down to work; writing and social life: 209–12, 530; M is distracted from work by the “unknown beauties” who throng the streets of Paris: III 70–71, and by his pursuit of Mme de Guermantes: 82–83. “If only I had been able to start writing!”: 196. He sends an article to Le Figaro: 474, 544. “The invisible vocation of which this book is the history”: 544. Trees near Balbec seem to warn him to set to work before it is too late: IV 560. He scans Le Figaro in vain for his article: V 6, 151. Continued procrastination; changes in the weather an excuse for not working: 100–2. Musings on art and literature while listening to Wagner; is there in art a more profound reality than in life, or is great art merely the result of superior craftsmanship?: 204–10, 259–60. Vinteuil’s septet restores his faith in art and in his vocation: 347–51 (cf. 503–5, 513–14). Appearance of his article in Le Figaro at last; a boost to his self-confidence as a writer; the pleasure of writing incompatible with social pleasures: 766–72. Renewed discouragement during a visit to Tansonville: VI 344, and after reading an unpublished passage from the Goncourt Journal which convinces him not only of his own lack of talent but of the vanity and falsehood of literature: 26, 38 (cf. 239, 254). Renunciation, for several long years, of his project for writing: 46. Salvation at last; the uneven paving-stones; M’s doubts suddenly dissipated; involuntary memory the key: 255–60.