The Year of Reading Proust discussion

This thread is for the discussion that will take place through Sunday, 27 Jan. of Swann's Way, to page 299 in ML / page 220 in LD (to the paragraph beginning: “And so, when the pianist had finished...” / “And so when the pianist had finished...”)

Reading Carter's The Proustian Quest, he quotes from a letter by Proust and has this to say:

"Comparing his novel to a cathedral, Proust referred to the Montjouvain scene at Combray as the column that supports the vault of his novel. ... The primary importance of this scene, evident from the novel itself, was underscored by Proust in a letter castigating critics who generally misunderstood the overall structure of the work, or who thought there was no structure at all:

j'ai si soigneusement bâti cet ouvrage que cet épisode du premier volume [la scene du sadisme à Montjouvain] est l'explication de la jalousie de mon jeune héros (view spoiler)[dans les quatrième et cinquième volumes (hide spoiler)], de sorte qu'en arrachant la colonne au chapiteau obscène j'aurais fait plus loin tomber la voûte. C'est ce que des critiques appellent des ouvrages sans composition et écrits au hasard des souvenirs"

The importance that Gothic architecture, with its supporting system of ribs, columns and buttresses, had for Proust as an inspiration to structure his work was discussed in week 2.

It's terrific that you pointed this out, Kalliope. This section starts with a bang in the witnessing of the sadism of Mlle Vinteuil towards her deceased father. This section is a key section in the beginning of the emotional theme, the push/pull of love/hatred in ISOLT, as much as the madeleines and tea is the start of the dream. If people thought ISOLT is only about rich people eating madeleines and tea, and whining about social niceties, they are deeply mistaken. This is quite a racy complex novel!

Here is my rough translation (of not good French) of the passage in The Proustian Quest that you marked:

"I carefully built this book so that the scene in the first volume (the sadism at Montjouvain) explains the jealousy of my young hero later (view spoiler)[in the fourth and fifth volumes (hide spoiler)], such that the great lewd column would lead us further down into the recess of the vault. This is what critics call a work with only random memories and no structure"

I was a bit flummoxed as to the image of the "vault" in this statement, since in a gothic cathedral it is the ceiling structure. Combray was named after a castle, and the vaults in a castle are usually underground. Then I thought of how the Gothic cathedral modified the usual underground crypt design where relics, etc. were moved to above ground, so I did a search on crypt and found details on the gothic cathedral of Chartres, in which the crypt is actually in both the exposed upper floor and the underground lower floor, Gothic Cathedral of Chartres: Crypt

"This series of chapels in the crypt are partly above and partly below ground. When visiting the cathedral proper, you are actually on the second floor of the structure!"

Aloha wrote: "Kalliope wrote: " ...j'ai si soigneusement bâti cet ouvrage que cet épisode du premier volume [la scene du sadisme à Montjouvain] est l'explication de la jalousie de mon jeune héros (view spoiler), de sorte qu'en arrachant la colonne au chapiteau obscène j'aurais fait plus loin tomber la voûte. C'est ce que des critiques appellent des ouvrages sans composition et écrits au hasard des souvenirs""

I think he is saying that were he to remove the column, ornamented with the sadistic scene, the entire vault or roof would collapse and then the book would become what the critics refer to as a work without any other plan apart from spontaneous memories.

(Translating is more difficult than I thought...)

Aloha wrote: "It's terrific that you pointed this out, Kalliope. This section starts with a bang in the witnessing of the sadism of Mlle Vinteuil towards her deceased father. This section is a key section in t..."

Yes, it is the sense that Fionnuala gives.. My very rough translation:

I have built this work so carefully that this episode from the first volume (the sadistic scene that takes place at Montjouvain) is the explanation for the jealousy felt by my young hero (later on in the book), so that if I were to extract the column from under this obscene capital, the vault would fall later on. …

Kalliope wrote: "Aloha wrote: "It's terrific that you pointed this out, Kalliope. This section starts with a bang in the witnessing of the sadism of Mlle Vinteuil towards her deceased father. This section is a ke..."

Ah! Thank you, Fionnuala and Kalliope. Now, the structure of the ceiling vault of the gothic cathedral makes sense.

I was confused with this expression "plus loin tomber la voûte". The "tomber la voûte" matches your translation, but the "plus loin" added to it was confusing to my rusty French.

Aloha wrote: "I was confused with this expression "plus loin tomber la voûte". The "tomber la voûte" matches your translation, but the "plus loin" added to it was confusing to my rusty French."

You are doing very well. It is not an easy extract. The "plus loin" means later on in the novel.

And yes, normally crypts are underground. Sites of devotion which would eventually become churches would be built at the place where a particular saint had died or being martyred.

That was the frustrating thing in reading The Proustian Quest, is that the quotations are in French. WC weaves in and out with the French quotations to his topic at hand, without giving an English translation of the quotations.

Metaphorically, I like the idea of a hidden vault, or even a vault in which some is exposed and some hidden, like our nature. On the other hand, the idea that even our base nature is also part of the heavenly ceiling vault of the cathedral is a nice twist.

I think Proust knew how to structure his book without Ruskin's help, and without following a proscribed structure of braces, columns etc (Gothic construction). Rather he is being writerly to his friends. He us being ingenuous to Gaigneron, massaging the later's ego a little, flattering him, as he always did to his correspondents. He is expanding on the simile/metaphor that Gaigneron has supplied.

So too in his letter to Mauriac given above, where he compares that particular arc to an arch, the idea is an isolated metaphor to help Mauriac understand the importance of the story arc and its place in the novel. Just because he uses an idea a few times, doesn't mean he has built the book around the whole theme of a cathedral :)

The same for where The Narrator says about how it was like a dress: in a typically Narratorly manner he states this comparison, then returns to a theme he has just abandoned (book as church) which feels grander, to heighten the earlier metaphor's imagery/effect (small vs large, commonplace vs majestic) to talk-up the task he has set himself.

I love this description of the reason behind Mlle Vinteuil's action:

"...It was not evil that gave her the idea of pleasure, that seemed to her attractive; it was pleasure, rather, that seemed evil. And as, each time she indulged in it, it was accompanied by evil thoughts such as ordinarily had no place in her virtuous mind, she came at length to see in pleasure itself something diabolical, to identify it with Evil...."(ML)

In French:

"...Ce n’est pas le mal qui lui donnait l’idée du plaisir, qui lui semblait agréable; c’est le plaisir qui lui semblait malin. Et comme chaque fois qu’elle s’y adonnait il s’accompagnait pour elle de ces pensées mauvaises qui le reste du temps étaient absentes de son âme vertueuse, elle finissait par trouver au plaisir quelque chose de diabolique, par l’identifier au Mal...."

Proustitute wrote: "Hey there early birds! I bet many of you are glad for your Ruskin preliminary read for last week and this week? :)"

You bet!

I'm loving Proust's satire of the nineteenth century mania for restoration led by the architect Viollet-le-Duc which resulted in the destruction of many medieval and renaissance churches as a result of attempts to restore them to their 'original' state.

In this week reading it's the first time I felt I could easily diferentiate narrator-child, with narrator-adult, since narrator-child couldn't speak about sadism in the way narrator-adult does in the Mlle Vinteul scene.

I really like the "column / vault" comparison for Mlle Vinteul scene, since the narrator-child is the one that has "discovered" the column, but it takes an adult personality to get in the vault, and look close into it. I'm very curious about how the adult-narrator will develop his insights into this "social" vault.

Fionnuala wrote: "I'm loving Proust's satire of the nineteenth century mania for restoration led by the architect Viollet-le-Duc which resulted in the destruction of many medieval and renaissance churches as a resul..."

Yes, I agree... I was surprised that he was so negative about Viollet-le-Duc. Most people are enraged now at the restoration he did, but that he was so critical in the early 20th century took me by surprise.

Aloha wrote: "Metaphorically, I like the idea of a hidden vault, or even a vault in which some is exposed and some hidden, like our nature. On the other hand, the idea that even our base nature is also part of ..."

My interpretation is not thematic, but of structure. Things are interconnected... At the beginning of the Mlle Vinteuil section the Narrator says:

On verra plus tard que pour de tout autres raisons, le souvenir de cette impression devait jouer un rôle important dans ma vie.

Which echoes the letter quoted by Mauriac above.

Nick wrote: "I think Proust knew how to structure his book without Ruskin's help, and without following a proscribed structure of braces, columns etc (Gothic construction). Rather he is being writerly to his fr..."

I understand your skepticism. And I cannot say yet whether I agree or disagree. I need to know a lot more. I guess this issue will trail for the rest of our reading year.

It is complex because it deals with creative processes and causation. But it is a fascinating topic..., because he did find himself in a literary cul-de-sac out of which he eventually did get out.

Kalliope wrote: "I understand your skepticism. And I cannot say yet whether I agree or disagree. I need to know a lot more. I guess this issue will trail for the rest of our reading year.

It is complex because it deals with creative processes and causation. But it is a fascinating topic..., because he did find himself in a literary cul-de-sac out of which he eventually did get out. "

It would be interesting to see whether the whole novel has any similarity to the structure of a cathedral, or whether he abandoned the idea because he cannot work it with the story. It would be more interesting to me if he was able to do that. Not that the story wouldn't be great on its own, but there would be more of an edge.

Kalliope wrote: "Aloha wrote: "My interpretation is not thematic, but of structure. Things are interconnected... At the beginning of the Mlle Vinteuil section the Narrator says: "

He stated that very clearly in the last section with the discussion of the Méséglise way and the Guermantes way, in how they are part of a whole. You can get to the Méséglise via the Guermantes way, and vice versa. However, you never walk both paths on the same day or walk, and are unaware of the other path while you're on one.

On M. Venteuil:

"un ancien organiste de village"..

Like César Franck.

Fionnuala wrote: "I'm loving Proust's satire of the nineteenth century mania for restoration led by the architect Viollet-le-Duc ... as a resul..."

I remember going to a major exhibition on Viollet-le-Duc in Paris (Grand Palais) a few years ago.

Kalliope wrote: "Fionnuala wrote: "I'm loving Proust's satire of the nineteenth century mania for restoration led by the architect Viollet-le-Duc ... as a resul..."

I remember going to a major exhibition on Violle..."

That must have been interesting. He had some great ideas but was a bit misguided.
Like you, I was surprised that Proust was critical of those restoration projects long before the extent of the damage they had caused was widely accepted.

Would we agree that Proust diagnosed Dr. Cottard with Asperger's Syndrome before Hans Asperger discovered the disorder? Wikipedia cites 1944 and ISOLT was published between 1913 and 1927.

In the Mlle Vinteuil's sadism scene, this reminds me of Edu's post about the eyes. I love the expression of the eyes being handed down like a family jewel.

ML:
"...was the likeness between her face and his, his mother’s blue eyes which he had handed down to her like a family jewel,..."

French:
"...c’était la ressemblance de son visage, les yeux bleus de sa mère à lui qu’il lui avait transmis comme un bijou de famille,..."

This refers back to the first week, in which the grandmother prefers the engraving over the photos of art work. There's a passage where the narrator compares his memory to Viollet-le-Duc's restoration. Then following:

"...And for such reconstruction memory furnishes me with more detailed guidance than is generally at the disposal of restorers: the pictures which it has preserved—perhaps the last surviving in the world today, and soon to follow the rest into oblivion—of what Combray looked like in my childhood days; pictures which, because it was the old Combray that traced their outlines upon my mind before it vanished, are as moving—if I may compare a humble landscape with those glorious works, reproductions of which my grandmother was so fond of bestowing on me—as those old engravings of the Last Supper or that painting by Gentile Bellini, in which one sees, in a state in which they no longer exist, the masterpiece of Leonardo and the portico of Saint Mark’s." ML

I take this to mean that although his memory is restorative like what Viollet-le-Duc was trying to do, it's more authentic in its recreation because it's his personal memories, like the artistic touches of the engravings of the Last Supper.

I love this week's section. It has some of the most aching passages I've ever read.

I think it was Proustitute who mentioned last week about faces. I love the section on the Duchesse de Guermantes. The Narrator's preconception of her, his first impression of her, then his re-impression of her.

And the ending of the Combray section is beautiful! I'll let ya'll discover it for yourselves.

Refresh my memory, in Carter, Tadie or some other biographical reading that I can't recall, Proust takes a photo of his father or his mother--which--into a male brothel and has it installed where it was visible & 'seeing'. Was this report in a letter or a transcript, an interview...was it true, putative, gossip...I've forgotten.

Eugene wrote: "Refresh my memory, in Carter, Tadie or some other biographical reading that I can't recall, Proust takes a photo of his father or his mother--which--into a male brothel and has it installed where i..."

Carter's "Proust in Love" (page 154) is one source.

Aloha wrote: "That was the frustrating thing in reading The Proustian Quest, is that the quotations are in French. WC weaves in and out with the French quotations to his topic at hand, without giving an English..."

My pet peeve also. However, in certain academic circles, I believed they assumed a bilingual reader. Also, by translating a passage into English...which translation would you use?

None of my reading groups has rolled from insight to wonderment, without someone asking about a word or phrase in French. Then, we detour and compare our translations-as we all have our favorite editions and don't conform.

That is why I am so curious to read William Carter's new "Swann's Way." It may become the definitive English translation.

From Yale U Press:
"Carter has carefully assessed and critiqued the various English-language translations of À la recherche du temps perdu and recognized both the strengths and weaknesses of the original English translation by C.K. Scott Moncrieff.
He has also discovered the extent to which subsequent revisions to Moncrieff’s work have, in their attempts to address certain weaknesses, introduced copious new problems and strayed, sometimes subtly and sometimes glaringly, much farther from Proust’s original than most English-language readers could have ever guessed."

Aloha wrote: "It would be interesting to see whether the whole novel has any similarity to the structure of a cathedral, or whether he abandoned the idea because he cannot work it with the story. It would be more interesting to me if he was able to do that. Not that the story wouldn't be great on its own, but there would be more of an edge.."

I haven't finished the book yet, but there is a symmetry about its structure.

Part 1 of the first section and the third section are almost identical in length, more or less 50 pages.

Are they the foundations or footings upon which the arch of the cathdral of Swann in Love is built?

"It would be interesting to see whether the whole novel has any similarity to the structure of a cathedral, or whether he abandoned the idea because he cannot work it with the story."

I think he abandoned it because he saw it as restrictive to his vision, and later references are metaphors to enoble his project. Just my opinion. If the novel were to resemble a Cathedral, I would suggest that Swann is not the cathedral, but more the entry (its portico giving intimations and warnings of the mores of adulthood, much like the carvings on say, Rheims or Chartres,) with Combray the bright sunlit porch.

Shame that Proustian Quest doesn't give English, not even in the back of the book!

Nick wrote: ""It would be interesting to see whether the whole novel has any similarity to the structure of a cathedral, or whether he abandoned the idea because he cannot work it with the story."

I think he a..."

I still think the cathedral model is a great fit for À la Recherche. Even individual sentences fit the model in a miniature way. They start out with a short piece, the porch of the cathedral as it were, then they veer off into subclauses, leading from one to the other but independent nonetheless like a series of side chapels opening of the nave of the cathedral before ending at the apse making again a direct link with the porch. The Combray section has the same shape, starting with the narrator wondering what bedroom he is waking in of all the bedrooms in his life and ending with the same meditation, having veered off on a series of connecting but independent episodes. There is a symmetry to the construction at every level. Perhaps this point has been made already?

Yes, there is definitely symmetry in the book, and episodic echoes within it.

Sorry to insist on this, but I think that it is not so much the layout of the Gothic church (porch, nave, side aisles etc… ) that offer the more clarifying analogy. This layout is also present in a Romanesque church (layout which was originally inspired in the Roman “basilica”, a kind of meeting hall). This layout is additive and in that sense they parallel the episodic, linear unfolding of the novel.

But what I think is more important and specific only to Gothic, and a more relevant analogy to Proust’s work, is the upwards structure of these Gothic churches,-- the crossing ribs that group downwards in the column and that are sustained on the side by the flying buttresses. It is this complex interconnected system that holds up the vaults and the complete edifice, and I think this is to what Proust refers in the quote from the letter above.

In the novel this sustaining grid-structure would correspond to be the internal running themes that cut across the succession of episodes. And this is what presumably differentiates La recherche from Jean Santeuil. The earlier draft of a novel had an episodic nature, but did not succeed in pulling itself together. While in La recherche Proust achieved to make all the episodes coalesce into a single whole.

Proustitute wrote: "Eugene, it was his mother's photograph."

Carter in his bio talks about this, but I would have to check the details later on today, but in his Quest he gives a more careful account. It seems that there is no basis for thinking that he did any profanation act with his mother’s portrait. He cites the existence of a testimony that in the male brothel they did spit on portraits of ladies from High Society, but that there is no “compelling evidence” of anything beyond that (location 1648 in the eformat)

Yes, one can see the novel as this, but I think Proust saw it as a useful and writerly metaphor at the time ( in the letter to Gaigneron, countering Jammes remarks and in Time Regained to shed a new perspective on his book) to describe his work. It was not a model to base his work from, or as an inspiration to structure his novel from. He came to that naturally in process of writing, realising that intimations of episodes would have to be established, and linkages made: a natural project of growth.

Whilst it is useful and fitting metaphor, that's all it is, for me. It is just that I do not see the book, wholesale as building that final image of a cathedral. Perhaps that is what I mean, and may be reading it that others mean think it does, where they do not mean this. I guess we will have to agree to disagree :)

Nick wrote: "Yes, one can see the novel as this, but I think Proust saw it as a useful and writerly metaphor at the time ( in the letter to Gaigneron, countering Jammes remarks and in Time Regained to shed a ne..."

Yes, I think I also agree with this, Nick.. the lack of structure in his writing was a problem when he was younger, but he solved it as he matured and thought about it from many points of views. It is too complex a matter to be solved in an Eureka-type of moment.

My insistence on the Gothic analogy is on the aspect of that architecture (internal framework) that helps our understanding.

In that instance, I guess it can help yes, it is a nice metaphor for picturing story arcs for instance. I had just read some comments as that MP had decided to consciously build his book on a deliberate model, directly inspired by cathedrals, and that one might look at the book through that extended metaphor, so it comes to reveal a cathedral in every aspect (which it doesn't for me, but I have yet to read it again, slowly and closely!)

Please let's carry on with our discussion, and I shall say no more on this. Don't want to hold it up on a minor discussion!

In this section the Narrator states for the first time his wish to become a writer, and immediately goes into the associated fears of suffering from writer's block.

In this section I also found interesting how gradually and subtly his viewpoints become more and more those of an older person.

Kalliope wrote: "..This layout is also present in a Romanesque church (layout which was originally inspired in the Roman “basilica”, a kind of meeting hall)..."

Sorry to go back to the architecture point as the discussion has now moved on but it was during the gothic period in architecture that side chapels began to be incorporated, at first in the sanctuary/choeur area but also eventually along the whole length of the building - I have seen an example somewhere but can't remember where - and the original basilica model had no side aisles, not to mention side chapels.

Having pointed out all this, I agree that what Proust intended when he spoke of modelling his work on the plan of a cathedral - and whether he persisted with this plan or not - referred only to the upwards structure as you say quite rightly - it's just that I see the writing visually in terms of these side chapels or digressions and he himself referred to side chapels in the passages about the aubépines. I'll have to look that up but I seem to remember that he described the hawthorn hedge as being like a series of sumptuously decorated side chapels...

Fionnuala wrote: "Having pointed out all this, I agree that what Proust intended when he spoke of modelling his work on the plan of a cathedral - and whether he persisted with this plan or not - referred only to the upwards structure as you say quite rightly - it's just that I see the writing visually in terms of these side chapels or digressions and he himself referred to side chapels in the passages about the aubépines. I'll have to look that up but I seem to remember that he described the hawthorn hedge as being like a series of sumptuously decorated side chapels..."

Whether he moved on from trying to model his work based on the plan of a gothic cathedral, he definitely started off trying to do that. Here are some metaphors in the ML translation. I'll look for the French, too. I'm skipping the LD since ML and French is all I have time for.

He started with a significant clue as to how he will build his story:

...an edifice occupying, so to speak, a four-dimensional space—the name of the fourth being Time—extending through the centuries its ancient nave, which, bay after bay, chapel after chapel, seemed to stretch across and conquer not merely a few yards of soil, but each successive epoch from which it emerged triumphant, hiding the rugged barbarities of the eleventh century in the thickness of its walls, through which nothing could be seen of the heavy arches, long stopped and blinded with coarse blocks of ashlar, except where, near the porch, a deep cleft had been hollowed out by the tower staircase, and veiling it even there by the graceful Gothic arcades which crowded coquettishly around it like a row of grown-up sisters who, to hide him from the eyes of strangers, arrange themselves smilingly in front of a rustic, peevish and ill-dressed younger brother; raising up into the sky above the Square a tower which had looked down upon Saint Louis, and seemed to see him still; and thrusting down with its crypt into a Merovingian darkness, through which, guiding us with groping finger-tips beneath the shadowy vault, powerfully ribbed like an immense bat’s wing of stone,...

Then described some of the characters as if they are art relics within the chapel such as Giotto's Charity:

...“Well, how goes it with Giotto’s Charity?” And indeed the poor girl, whose pregnancy had swelled and stoutened every part of her, even including her face and her squarish, elongated cheeks, did distinctly suggest those virgins, so sturdy and mannish as to seem matrons rather, in whom the Virtues are personified in the Arena Chapel. And I can see now that those Virtues and Vices of Padua resembled her in another respect as well....

And the hedge that Fionnulala mentioned:

...The hedge resembled a series of chapels, whose walls were no longer visible under the mountains of flowers that were heaped upon their altars;

Until we finish all seven volumes, we don't know whether he abandoned the plan or followed it.

In the starting paragraph of the Combray, Part One, his intro. had a clue as to his intention:

...it seemed to me that I myself was the immediate subject of my book: a church, a quartet, the rivalry between François I and Charles V...

In Part II, Combray, more church metaphors:

...Combray at a distance, from a twenty-mile radius, as we used to see it from the railway when we arrived there in the week before Easter, was no more than a church epitomising the town, representing it, speaking of it and for it to the horizon,...

...streets with the solemn names of saints, not a few of whom figured in the history of the early lords of Combray, such as the Rue Saint-Hilaire, the Rue Saint-Jacques, in which my aunt’s house stood, the Rue Sainte-Hildegarde, which ran past her railings, and the Rue du Saint-Esprit, on to which the little garden gate opened;...

I'm thinking that with the importance of the steeple in the Combray section, that the steeple is the steeple of the church of Combray, but the church representing the whole town of Combray, and the height of the gothic Church represents time with its intricate paths (Guermantes or Méséglise that eventually forms a unity) we travel throughout time as we change and grow, the fourth-dimension he mentioned.

Ach, I'm skipping finding the French. Too much material. :oD

In the Church section of Combray, the way he described how much he love his church, but almost as if he's describing the living, common towns folks, in particular in the apse of Combray.

And then the apse of Combray: what can one say of that? It was so crude, so devoid of artistic beauty, even of religious feeling. From the outside, since the street crossing which it commanded was on a lower level, its great wall was thrust upwards from a basement of unfaced ashlar, jagged with flints, in which there was nothing particularly ecclesiastical, the windows seemed to have been pierced at an abnormal height, and its whole appearance was that of a prison wall rather than of a church. And certainly in later years, when I recalled all the glorious apses that I had seen, it would never have occurred to me to compare with any one of them the apse of Combray. Only, one day, turning out of a little street in some country town, I came upon three alley-ways that converged, and facing them an old wall, rough-hewn and unusually high, with windows pierced in it far overhead and the same asymmetrical appearance as the apse of Combray. And at that moment I did not say to myself, as I might have done at Chartres or at Rheims, with what power the religious feeling had been expressed therein, but instinctively I exclaimed: “The Church!”

The church! Homely and familiar,...

This is an interesting correlation of the theme throughout in which something plain and uninspiring becomes beautiful, which you'll see in Swann's preference, and in this section with the Mme de Guermantes.

His idealization of her as his muse before he saw her:

...I used to dream that Mme de Guermantes, taking a sudden capricious fancy to me, invited me there, that all day long she stood fishing for trout by my side. And when evening came, holding my hand in hers, as we passed by the little gardens of her vassals she would point out to me the flowers that leaned their red and purple spikes along the tops of the low walls, and would teach me all their names. She would make me tell her, too, all about the poems that I intended to compose....

When he saw her:

...My disappointment was immense....“So that’s Mme de Guermantes—that’s all she is!” were the words underlying the attentive and astonished expression with which I gazed upon this image which, naturally enough, bore no resemblance to those that had so often, under the same title of “Mme de Guermantes,” appeared in my dreams,...but was so real that everything, down to the fiery little spot at the corner of her nose, attested to her subjection to the laws of life,...

But with further gazing:

...And my eyes resting upon her fair hair, her blue eyes, the lines of her neck, and overlooking the features which might have reminded me of the faces of other women, I cried out within myself as I admired this deliberately unfinished sketch: “How lovely she is! What true nobility! It is indeed a proud Guermantes, the descendant of Geneviève de Brabant, that I have before me!”

Aloha wrote: "And the hedge that Fionnulala mentioned:
...The hedge resembled a series of chapels, whose walls were no longer visible under the mountains of flowers that were heaped upon their altars"

Thanks for locating that passage, Aloha.

Until we finish all seven volumes, we don't know whether he abandoned the plan or followed it.

Exactly. Something else to watch for as we read!

I do not think anyone is denying the use of imagery and analogies from medieval architecture, and least of all me (I have posted several comments on this).

I think that what Nick is questioning, and I am reserving my opinion until I know more, is to what extent Marcel Proust needed Gothic architecture to solve the literary difficulty that he had encountered when he wrote Jean Santeuil. Whether he sorted his novel out as a result of a more complex process of maturation, in which his visiting the churches, his studying of E. Mâle’s books and his correspondence with him, his reading of Ruskin and translation of La Bible d'Amiens, were significant contributors, but not the only ones. Someone could understand perfectly well the architecture but still be unable to write a coherent work of 4 or 5 thousand pages.

The Genesis of his work must have been very complex. The book grew and got more elaborate as he wrote. For example Le Côté de Guermantes was going to be the second volume...