Translations:CP 03780/5/en

Your letter does not persuade me at all and what saddens me more is that mine (you are undoubtedly speaking of the letter before last because I do not see what in the last could have had this effect, nor indeed, I must say, in the one before last) "disheartens" you. All I want is for you to be happy and hence it is me who is disheartened. You are playing with words when you say that you are a publisher, not a printer . Because one of the principal duties of a publisher is the printing of his books. You have been a theatre director 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 imaginable. 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 that is an embarrassment to me, but after all that it has just meant going back to the same one, since it is the same name that was given to me in December when we left Semeuse. He may well have 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 a miracle worker he is. Grant me this pleasure and I promise you a real “stupefaction”. My dear friend and publisher, you seem to reproach me for my editing techniques. 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, exclaimed, “But this is a new book!” I am apologising to you in two ways, the first by saying that all moral quality requires material change. 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 may have been to my advantage that the brilliance of your publishing house added a little lustre to my book. 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, out of a feeling of friendship, as did you. 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 things were to turn out differently, I have left all my notebooks numbered for you to take, and I count on you to publish them in their entirety. I have not yet reached the other points of your letter. But fatigue stops me, and I leave you with a handshake.