The Cambridge Introduction to Marcel Proust - Adam A. Watt [58]
She is the Narrator’s central preoccupation in The Captive and key events are often framed by or recounted in relation to developments in their relationship. This is the case with the death of Bergotte, another of the novel’s peaks of intensity, where, in the shadow of the uncompromising finality of death, a life lived is weighed up against the achievements of art. Proust avoids sentimentalism and leads us, with poise and humour, between the heady raptures of art and the ineluctable indignities of dying (C, 207–9; P, 1743–4). When newspaper reports of Bergotte’s death appear they contradict Albertine’s story that the previous evening she had met Bergotte and spoken with him at some length. The Narrator does not suspect a thing at the time ‘so artlessly had she described the meeting’, for, as he puts it, ‘it was not until much later that I discovered her charming skill in lying naturally’ (C, 209–10; P, 1744). It is important to note, however, that Albertine is by no means the only liar in the relationship: the Narrator very often lies or says the opposite of what he thinks in order to provoke admissions or revelations from Albertine. The lesson learned, with time, is that truths are always revealed, but seldom when one is actively pursuing them.
Bergotte’s death takes a prominent place in the narrative, as we might expect for the writer whose novels comforted the Narrator like the embrace ‘of a long-lost father’ (SW, 114; 84). As The Captive progresses, a number of deaths (such as those of Princesse Sherbatoff and Mme de Villeparisis) are mentioned, dropped parenthetically into conversation by socialites eager not to dwell on the past for fear, perhaps, of having to acknowledge the finite nature of their own existence. Saniette ill-advisedly speaks critically of Morel’s performance to M. Verdurin, receives a ferocious dressing-down and is made to leave, whereupon he has a debilitating attack from which he never fully recovers (C, 802–3; P, 1802–3). Subsequently Charlus is humiliated by rumours and insinuations spread spitefully by Mme Verdurin, peeved at the ungracious attitude of his guests and greatly fearful of losing to Charlus and his set Morel, ‘her’ musician and a valuable asset in her social ascent. This accumulation of unpleasantness, added to the picture of the vulgar Verdurins sketched first in ‘Swann in Love’ and developed in Sodom and Gomorrah, results in an image of the couple as not only crass and self-interested but also cruel and callous.
After the soirée, however, readers are challenged by an account of how the Verdurins actually helped Saniette, ruined by gambling, after his stroke. Until his death and unbeknownst to all but Cottard, who told the Narrator the tale at Saniette’s funeral, M. Verdurin provided him with an income which he was led to believe had been left to him in Princesse Sherbatoff’s will. Suddenly we are faced with an unexpected side to M. Verdurin, with which we are ill prepared to cope. The Narrator reflects that: ‘it is as difficult to present a fixed image of a character as of societies and passions. For a character alters no less than they do, and if one tries to take a snapshot of what is relatively immutable in it, one finds it presenting a succession of different aspects … to the disconcerted lens’ (C, 373; P, 1849). The lessons in perspective and point of view, begun with Elstir on the first trip to Balbec in relation to visual art and the physical environment, are still ongoing, now expanding