In Search of Lost Time, Volume I by Marcel Proust

Author:Marcel Proust [Proust, Marcel]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
ISBN: 978-0-679-64178-0
Publisher: Random House Publishing Group
Published: 2011-02-01T16:00:00+00:00

“There is,” began Brichot, hammering out each syllable, “a rather curious definition of intelligence by that gentle old anarchist Fénelon …”

“Just listen to this!” Mme Verdurin rallied Forcheville and the doctor. “He’s going to give us Fénelon’s definition of intelligence. Most interesting. It’s not often you get a chance of hearing that!”

But Brichot was keeping Fénelon’s definition until Swann had given his. Swann remained silent, and, by this fresh act of recreancy, spoiled the brilliant dialectical contest which Mme Verdurin was rejoicing at being able to offer to Forcheville.

“You see, it’s just the same as with me!” said Odette peevishly. “I’m not at all sorry to see that I’m not the only one he doesn’t find quite up to his level.”

“Are these de La Trémouailles whom Mme Verdurin has shown us to be so undesirable,” inquired Brichot, articulating vigorously, “descended from the couple whom that worthy old snob Mme de Sévigné said she was delighted to know because it was so good for her peasants? True, the Marquise had another reason, which in her case probably came first, for she was a thorough journalist at heart, and always on the look-out for ‘copy.’ And in the journal which she used to send regularly to her daughter, it was Mme de La Trémouaille, kept well-informed through all her grand connections, who supplied the foreign politics.”

“No, no, I don’t think they’re the same family,” hazarded Mme Verdurin.

Saniette, who ever since he had surrendered his untouched plate to the butler had been plunged once more in silent meditation, emerged finally to tell them, with a nervous laugh, the story of a dinner he had once had with the Duc de La Trémoïlle, from which it transpired that the Duke did not know that George Sand was the pseudonym of a woman. Swann, who was fond of Saniette, felt bound to supply him with a few facts illustrative of the Duke’s culture proving that such ignorance on his part was literally impossible; but suddenly he stopped short, realising that Saniette needed no proof, but knew already that the story was untrue for the simple reason that he had just invented it. The worthy man suffered acutely from the Verdurins’ always finding him so boring; and as he was conscious of having been more than ordinarily dull this evening, he had made up his mind that he would succeed in being amusing at least once before the end of dinner. He capitulated so quickly, looked so wretched at the sight of his castle in ruins, and replied in so craven a tone to Swann, appealing to him not to persist in a refutation which was now superfluous—“All right; all right; anyhow, even if I’m mistaken it’s not a crime, I hope”—that Swann longed to be able to console him by insisting that the story was indubitably true and exquisitely funny. The doctor, who had been listening, had an idea that it was the right moment to interject “Se non é vero,” but he was not quite certain of the words, and was afraid of getting them wrong.

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