Translations:CP 02902/15/en

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↑ According to Philip Kolb, the only outing that Proust made between the end of October 1914 and the end of January 1915 would have been motivated by his wish to present his condolences to Louis Gautier-Vignal for the death of his brother-in-law, Rudolphe de Foras, killed in action 27 September 1914, a visit that he places in November 1914 (Kolb, XIII, no. 13, note 3). But the correspondence with Gautier-Vignal does not mention any visit of condolence in October, November, or even December 1914: it is only on 7 January [1915] that Proust proposes to go and see him "one evening, very late, at your house" because he senses that he is unhappy "with a sadness without any cause that I am aware of", imagining him to de "relatively happy" (CP 02891; Kolb, XIV, no. 2; our italics). Having dated his letter (7 January), he no doubt was coming to receive the melancholy New Year wishes of Gautier-Vignal and clearly had no idea that the latter had lost his brother-in-law a few weeks earlier and, more recently, his brother Paul, killed in action 27 December 1914 - a death that he learned of not from the newspaper obituaries but from the reply of his correspondent (see his letter to Gautier-Vignal of [18 January 1915]: CP 02899; Kolb, XIV, no. 10). But Proust could not have made a late night visit to Gautier-Vignal around 7 or 18 January: his correspondent was in Nice during this whole time, the postmark proving where it was sent from (see note 1 to each of these letters). Not being able to prove this supposed visit of condolence to Gautier-Vignal (neither in November 1914, nor in January 1915), if we adhere to the information furnished by Proust in his letters to Lucien Daudet and Mme Scheikévitch (CP 02904; Kolb, XIV, no. 15): his only outing between the end of October 1914 and 31 January 1915 must therefore be the one he made to Mme Edwards, as he writes here. - In 1915, it was not unknown to him that Misia Godebska had been divorced from Alfred Edwards (her second husband) since February 1909 and had become the companion of the painter José Maria Sert (who she married later, in 1920); but at this period, a divorced woman was always referred to by the name of her ex-husband. [FL]

[n5-1] According to Philip Kolb, the only outing that Proust made between the end of October 1914 and the end of January 1915 would have been motivated by his wish to present his condolences to Louis Gautier-Vignal for the death of his brother-in-law, Rudolphe de Foras, killed in action 27 September 1914, a visit that he places in November 1914 (Kolb, XIII, no. 13, note 3). But the correspondence with Gautier-Vignal does not mention any visit of condolence in October, November, or even December 1914: it is only on 7 January [1915] that Proust proposes to go and see him "one evening, very late, at your house" because he senses that he is unhappy "with a sadness without any cause that I am aware of", imagining him to de "relatively happy" (CP 02891; Kolb, XIV, no. 2; our italics). Having dated his letter (7 January), he no doubt was coming to receive the melancholy New Year wishes of Gautier-Vignal and clearly had no idea that the latter had lost his brother-in-law a few weeks earlier and, more recently, his brother Paul, killed in action 27 December 1914 - a death that he learned of not from the newspaper obituaries but from the reply of his correspondent (see his letter to Gautier-Vignal of [18 January 1915]: CP 02899; Kolb, XIV, no. 10). But Proust could not have made a late night visit to Gautier-Vignal around 7 or 18 January: his correspondent was in Nice during this whole time, the postmark proving where it was sent from (see note 1 to each of these letters). Not being able to prove this supposed visit of condolence to Gautier-Vignal (neither in November 1914, nor in January 1915), if we adhere to the information furnished by Proust in his letters to Lucien Daudet and Mme Scheikévitch (CP 02904; Kolb, XIV, no. 15): his only outing between the end of October 1914 and 31 January 1915 must therefore be the one he made to Mme Edwards, as he writes here. - In 1915, it was not unknown to him that Misia Godebska had been divorced from Alfred Edwards (her second husband) since February 1909 and had become the companion of the painter José Maria Sert (who she married later, in 1920); but at this period, a divorced woman was always referred to by the name of her ex-husband. [FL]

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Translations:CP 02902/15/en

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