CP 02924/en

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Marcel Proust to Eugénie Lémel [first days of March 1915]

(Click on the link above to see this letter and its notes in the Corr-Proust digital edition, including all relevant hyperlinks.)

[1]

My dear Eugénie[2]

I thank you a thousand times for your letter and the ever so tender feelings that you share with me[3]. The arduous consequences of my problems are too complicated for me to speak of to you in a letter. I have good news about Monsieur Robert[4], of M. Hahn[5], and of Nicolas[6]. But, naturally, we will never know what tomorrow will hold. Antoine’s son has left but is not yet on the firing line[7]. Many of my friends have been killed, but I do not know whether you are acquainted with them. Among the people who came to the house in your time, young Bénac was killed[8], little Tirman and little Catusse were injured[9], Madame Berge’s son (the daughter of Félix Faure) is imprisoned in Germany (I learned in the latest news that he is believed to have been killed) [10], little Derbanne[11] and M. de Fénelon were killed[12]. I cannot tell you what sadness the deaths of young people so full of bravery caused me. Monsieur de Fénelon was at the French Legation in Norway[13]. The government had asked him to stay there, but he insisted upon enlisting and going into the trenches. His sister, the Marquise de Montebello, had had her young husband killed by lightning three years earlier[14]. All of this enormous fortune will go to no-one. But money is meaningless. What was admirable about the Comte de Fénelon was his heart, his marvellous intelligence. You might recall that we went to Holland together [15].

Believe, my dear Eugénie, my sincere best regards.

Marcel Proust

Am I mistaken? Haven’t you been to Madame Thierry-Mieg’s[16] in the past? Because I saw that one of the Thierry-Mieg sons had been killed, I do not know if it’s that one[17]. On the other hand Mme Raimbert’s[18] nephew, Baron Lejeune was killed[19]. He just wed the daughter of Princess Murat [20], sister-in-law of my best friend the Marquis d'Albufera[21].


[22] [23]

Notes

  1. ↑ Letter dates from after 27 February 1915 (mention of the death of a son of Thierry-Mieg read about in the newspaper: see note 8 below) and several days before the letter to Georges de Lauris written [about 10 March 1915] (CP 02925; Kolb, XIV, no. 36: see notes 16 and 18 below). It must date then from the first days of March 1915. [PK, PW, FL]
  2. ↑ Eugénie Lémel was Mme Proust's chambermaid from 1890 or earlier: see the letter of [28 April 1890]: (CP 00023; Kolb, I, no. 23) and possibly up until 1901 (see the letter of [30 August 1901]: CP 00585; Kolb, II, no. 279). We have very little information about her, only that she died shortly before 4 August 1915 (letter from Proust to an unknown person, dated 4 August 1915: CP 02986; Kolb, XIV, no. 98). In Jean Santeuil Proust gave the first name Eugénie to a chambermaid (JS, p. 357 - see the manuscript, NAF 16615, f. 349 v: "Oh! the towels put in her bedroom by Eugénie [...]"). [PK, FL]
  3. ↑ No letter from Eugénie Lémel has been discovered. Proust praised her epistolary gifts several times. In the only other currently known letter from Proust to this recipient, probably dating from January 1915, he was already using these same terms: "your letter of good wishes (for which I thank you) reawakens the remorse I feel about not having yet thanked you for the such exquisite feelings that you expressed to me in the one before." (CP 05416; Cher ami..., p. 105 and p. 350, BPRS 59). When she was still in the Prousts' service several letters from Marcel to his mother show that he enjoyed corresponding with this chambermaid: "Thank Eugénie very much for her charming letter. I'm going to reply to her" (letter from [24 September 1899]: CP 00522; Kolb, II, no. 216); or again: "remarkable letter [...] from Eugénie" (letter from [30 August 1901]: CP 00585; Kolb, II, no. 279). [PW]
  4. ↑ Eugénie called Marcel Proust's brother "Monsieur Robert", according to the customs of domestic servants of the time (see P. Guiral and G. Thuillier, La Vie quotidienne des domestiques en France au XIXe, Paris, Hachette, 1978, p. 213). Robert Proust had left for Verdun as medical officer shortly after mobilization and operated there courageously under dangerous conditions: see Proust's letter to Robert de Billy [between 8 and 11 April 1915] (CP 02915 and its note 8; Kolb, XIV, no. 26). [PK, PW, FL]
  5. ↑ At that time Reynaldo Hahn was in Argonne: see the postcard from Hahn to Proust [shortly before 5 March? 1915] (CP 02913; Kolb, XIV, no. 24) or Proust's letter to Robert de Billy [between 8 and 11 April 1915], p. 6 (CP 02915; Kolb, XIV, no. 26). [PW, FL]
  6. ↑ Nicolas Cottin, Proust's valet, was called up mid-August 1914. Proust had already passed on his news to Eugénie Lémel in a previous letter: "Nicolas is in the East, I don't know exactly where." (CP 05416; Cher ami..., p. 350, BPRS 59 - see note 3 above). He died in the Saint-Antoine hospital in Paris, 4 July 1916, from pleurisy contracted at the front (see his record in the military recruitment register, as well in the database "Mémoire des hommes" [Memorial to the men], in the category "Did not die for France"). [PK, PW]
  7. ↑ Several months earlier Proust had sent news to Eugénie Lemel about this young man: "Antoine's son is leaving in the next few days". (CP 05416; Cher ami..., p. 350, BRS 59). This refers to André Yves (or Yvon) Bertholom, born 26 October 1895 at Rosporden (Finistère), son of Antoine and Louise Bertholom, the concierges for 102, boulevard Haussmann (see their biographical details on the Corr-Proust website). According to his papers in the military recruitment register, he had been enlisted on 27 December 1914 to the 42e Régiment d'infanterie, then he was reassigned to the 3 June 1915 to the 146e Régiment d'infanterie; wounded in the ankle by shrapnel on 4 July 1915, after several months of hospital treatment and convalescence, he had to move to the artillery then to tanks. A letter from Proust of December 1914 (CP 02854; Kolb, XIII, no. 203) informs us that Antoine's son was then at the "Avor camp": only being nineteen years of age he was probably undergoing his period of military training. André Bertholom survived the war (see his biographical details on the Corr-Proust website). [PK, PW, FL]
  8. ↑ Jean Bénac, a young lawyer, was the son of André and Edmée Bénac, old friends of the Proust family. He was killed by a shell on 15 December 1914, at Thann, in Alsace (see his military record in the database "Mémoire des hommes" [Memorial to the men]). Jean Bénac may have perhaps served as a model for the character of Robert de Saint-Loup during the war (see Pyra Wise, "Jean Bénac dans l'Enfer de la Grande Guerre : une source de Robert de Saint-Loup au front" [Jean Bénac in the Hell of the Great War: a source for Robert de Saint-Loup at the front], Quaderni Proustiani, no. 12, 2018, pp. 113-140). [PK, PW, FL]
  9. ↑ This refers to Jacques Tirman and Charles Catusse, about whom Proust also sent news to Eugénie Lémel in his letter of January 1915: "Young Catusse and Tirman, both of whom you know, were seriously wounded but have recovered and gone back to fight". (CP 05416; Cher ami..., p. 350, BPRS 59). For Mme Catusse's son see his biographical details on the Corr-Proust website. As for Jacques Tirman, he must be Jacques Comolet-Tirman (1884-1955), son of Louise Tirman, who was the only daughter of the prefect and former governor general of Algeria, Louis Tirman (see Vincent Wright, Les Préfets de Gambetta, Paris, Presses de l’Université Paris-Sorbonne, 2007, p. 400). [PK, PW]
  10. ↑ Antoinette Faure, daughter of President Félix Faure, childhood fried of Marcel Proust, wife of René Berge, had three children, one of whom was Jacques Berge, killed by the enemy 22 August 1914 (see his record in the military recruitment register, and in the database "Mémoire des hommes" [Memorial to the men]). In a letter to Georges de Lauris [about 10 March 1915] (see CP 02925; Kolb, XIV, no. 36), Proust mentions the circumstances of his friend Mme Berge who, "just eight days ago was officially informed by a friend from the Ministry [that her son] was a prisoner", official information that was shortly afterwards revealed to have been incorrect: "Due to a stupid mistake three hundred families have gone from mourning to joy and from joy to mourning that week". The reference to "that week" suggests that the letter to Lauris was written the following week. The addition inserted between the lines at this point in the letter to Eugénie Lémel shows the moment when the incorrect good news had been contradicted: therefore this letter must precede the one to Lauris by a few days. [PK, PW, FL]
  11. ↑ This can only refer to Joseph Noël Derbanne, born 25 December 1880, lieutenant in the 28e régiment d'infanterie, killed by the enemy on 29 August 1914 at Macquigny (Aisne). He was the son of M. Gustave Derbanne, broker, and his wife, née Léonie Rosalie Lévy. We have not found in the database "Mémoire des hommes" [Memorial to the men] any other Derbanne killed by the enemy in 1914 or 1915. His brother Jacques, born 7 August 1876, solicitor's clerk, had been discharged in 1897 for "myopia greater than six diopters" and had not been called up (see his record in the military recruitment register); he was declared fit for military service by the Review Board of the Seine on 10 March 1915 (that being after this letter to Eugénie Lémel) but obtained a suspension until 12 June 1915. He did not rejoin his regiment until 29 November 1915 and, as a result of phlebitis, was reclassified into the auxiliary services 6 June 1916 as secretary of staff, and survived the war. [FL]
  12. ↑ Bertrand de Salignac-Fénelon, fallen at Mametz 17 December 1914 (see the military recruitment register, DR1 976, and his listing in "Died for France 14-18"), was for a long time reported as missing in action without it being known whether he was dead, seriously wounded, or a prisoner in Germany. In January 1915 Proust confided to Maria de Madrazo: "Bertrand de Fénelon has perhaps been killed. Nobody knows anything. The thought makes me mad with grief" (CP 02895; Kolb, XIV, no. 6). Through a letter of 17 February 1915, the Marquise de Montebello, Fénelon's sister, informed Proust that a witness said that he had seen him fall, mortally wounded. (CP 02908; Kolb, XIV, no. 19), but Proust continued to hope that he was only wounded. Antoine Bibesco, passing through Paris at the end of February or beginning of March 1915, informed Proust during a visit that appeared to take place on 27 February that Fénelon was now presumed dead (see Proust's letter to Louis de Robert of [beginning of March 1915]: CP 02921, Kolb, XIV, no. 32). But after several days of distress, Proust once again began to hope that Fénelon was only (seriously) wounded, considering that there was as yet no proof of his death (see his letter to Lauris [about 10 March 1915]: CP 0295; Kolb, XIV, no. 36). It was through the announcements death which appeared in Le Figaro, 13 March 1915, p. 3, under the column "Le Monde et la Ville - Deuil" [Society and Town - Mourning] that he learned that Fénelon's death had now been confirmed. The present letter to Eugénie Lémel must then date from between Antoine Bibesco's visit of [27 February 1915?] which gave Fénelon up for dead, and the moment when Proust began to hope again at the start of March (before he was forced to admit on 13 March that no further hope was possible). [PK, PW, FL]
  13. ↑ Note 13
  14. ↑ Note 14
  15. ↑ Note 15
  16. ↑ Note 16
  17. ↑ Note 17
  18. ↑ Note 18
  19. ↑ Note 19
  20. ↑ Note 20
  21. ↑ Note 21
  22. ↑ Translation notes:
  23. ↑ Contributors:
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