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Revision as of 01:54, 20 September 2022
Marcel Proust to Gaston Gallimard [21 or 22 May 1919]
(Click on the link above to see this letter and its notes in the Corr-Proust digital edition, including all relevant hyperlinks.)
Dear friend
Your letter[2] does not persuade me at all and what saddens me more is that mine (you are undoubtedly speaking of the letter before last[3] because I do not see what in the last[4] could have had this effect, nor indeed, I must say, in the one before last) disheartens you. I would only want your joy and hence it is me who is disheartened. You are fixating on language, when you say that you are a publisher, not a printer [5]. Because a publisher, in principle, shares in the duties of printing these books. You have been a director of theatre in America and I think that it is to that, much more than to the distinction that you make between printer and publisher, that I owe the most botched publication of l’Ombre des Jeunes filles en fleurs that one can see. Let us admit for an instant that all the faults are mine, there are proofreaders for a reason. You tell me that you have been from printer to printer, I thank you for it and I am confused about it, but then all that has been to return to the same one, since it is the same name that was said to me in December when we left Semeuse[6]. Perhaps it has for that matter admirable qualities, but I beg you to keep a copy of the pages that he has extracted from À l’Ombre des Jeunes filles en fleurs for the Nouvelle Revue Française. We will read them one evening together one evening at the Ritz or at mine and you will see what is this miracle. Grant me this pleasure and I promise you a real “stupefaction”[7]. My dear friend and publisher, you seem to reproach me for my editing techniques[8]. I realise that they complicate everything (not in the case of the Revue, at any rate!). But when you asked me to leave Grasset to come to you, you knew this, because you came with Copeau, who before Grasset’s redrafted proof, wrote: “But this is a new book!” I am apologising to you in two ways, the first by saying that all moral quality has the function of material difference. As you have the goodness to find richness that appeals to you in my writing, you can recognise that it is precisely due to this overindulgence that I reinfuse it by living, which physically translates into these additions. You can also recognise that, just as you gave me a great demonstration of friendship in asking me for my books, it is also in friendship that I gave them to you. When I sent you the Swann manuscript and you refused it, it was of interest to me that the brilliance of your publishing house could represent this book a little. Since it appeared in Grasset’s publishing house, I don’t know how, but it managed to get lots of supporters, so much so that I could publish the following parts through Grasset without fearing that they would go unnoticed. I did as I was told by taking them away from him and leaving them with you, based on a friendship thought to be as fond as ours. Alas, you left, I haven’t stopped receiving books from the others (for there are publishers that have printers, you would believe it if you saw the pile of uncut works I have received which are in my bedroom) but no page proofs. I think that they will arrive. I no longer have the same strength and that is maybe why I, in turn, will be a bit slow. Provided that everything will be published in my lifetime, that would be good, and if it were to happen[9] differently, I have left all my notebooks numbered so that you would take them, and I count on you to publish in their entirety[10]. I have not yet reached the other points of your letter. But fatigue stops me, and I leave you with a handshake.
Affectionately
Marcel Proust
I have still not received the rights from Grasset. I’m counting on you.
The moment when this letter should have left, I received a charming word from Grasset asking me to give him the first print of my book for a 200,000 copy literary review that he founded with Jean Dupuy. I am going to tell him that it is impossible, since my book will be published shortly[11]. As a matter of fact, I found June to be a detestable month, but it is better not to delay another day.