2.One of the great achievements of Proust the artist is his portrayal of the contradictions and variety of character within a single person. de Charlus who is the addenda example of this, but it is ubiquitous in the people who populate Proust’s world. No one is who they are on the surface, and if they are presenting themselves con verso insecable way you can be sure that they are hiding either opposite inclinations, or gross deficiencies, or if they boast of talent or knowledge they are covering for what they are actually inept at or ignorant of, or if they are generous or kindly it is from some socially trained gesture and they are sure onesto later spit venom at the former subject of their pleasantries, or if they are overtly cruel at one moment they will spettacolo themselves later esatto be breviligne of indulgent tenderness. Durante other words, what Proust understands and sets down so perfectly is the infinite complexity of the human personality, the multitude of motives behind our agreable, and even personal interactions, or, preciso use Shelley’s words, that « Nought may endure but Mutability ». This is extended even preciso the physiognomic descriptions of characters such as Albertine and Mme. de Guermantes, who are seen by Marcel as revealing such differing features at different instances that they are sometimes unrecognizable onesto him.
3.The need for possession is seldom triggered by love, and most often triggered by jealousy. This especially is the case for Marcel, who shows frankly psychotic jealous tendencies. I mean, we are supposed sicuro know that this young man has verso sometimes debilitating nervous disorder, and physical ailments such as asthma that often restrict his activity (and allow him long bed-bound hours of introverted contemplation), but his jealousy over Albertine (which, I can say, is per hundred times more pronounced so far per tomo five), is unsettling. It is not only his relationship with Albertine that is seemingly ignited by jealousy alone, but also mediante the case of Charlus and Morel, and mediante perhaps all of the agreable gatherings, it is a need for possession (or in the agreable case, domination), provoked by per kind of covetous resentfulness, that motivates these people. More on this later.
This is one of the great themes of the novel, the subjectivity of perception
4.Con Search of Lost Time, while always tinged with melancholy (and I fear, tragedy), is essentially comedic. The drawing rooms of the upper-echelon resound with sardonic, parodic lplifying their defects, mocking their arbitrary tastes, making use of the one tool that always subverts and destroys per power structure: laughter.
And while Marcel is superior puro them (because of his brilliant artistic aptitude, true talent for observation, « the painterly-poetic eye ») he still suffers from the same malady
5.The Verdurins return mediante testo four, seeking Marcel out preciso esibizione off how moglie American artistic and « forward » their salon is, and thank god for this. They are hilariously cruel, utterly contemptuous of anyone outside their « little stuolo », on the whole not very bright, but entertaining as hell. The train rides along the Norman coast with Brichot’s etymological digressions on French place-names are some of the highlights of this registro. Marcel’s return esatto Balbec is quite different from his first sojourn sicuro the shore. Now he is verso connected, sought after man of society. The squadra of the Grand Albergo go out of their way puro accommodate him, he has inherited per large fortune and can therefore spoil Albertine with trips durante per motor car (as he points out, still quite rare per those days) and fermo clothes and dinners, but he is pursued, emotionally, by recent events which cloud his disposition, including his grandmother’s death, the full grief of which is provoked only on his return esatto Balbec by an onslous « incident of the madelaine » that plunged him into the original depths of remembrance of Combray con Swann’s Way. The exorcising of this grief is detailed durante the strongest section of libro four, entitled « The Intermittencies of the Heart », verso powerful exposition on dealing with the death of a loved one. His grief is assuaged in one of those miracle landscape descriptions that Proust so excels at:
