PROUST, Marcel (1871-1922)

PROUST, Marcel (1871-1922)

Autograph letter signed “Marcel” to Louis d’Albufera
N.p, c. 21st December 1904, composter’s date of reception [24th december 1904] 2 pages in-8, mourning paper
Reciptient autograph note “rép[ondu]
Usual fold marks, very slight tear on central margin

“The sad embarrassment that I am…”

“Mon cher Louis, bien que je n’aie pas reçu de réponse de toi (ce qui signifiait que je ne devais pas sortir), j’ai tout de même réfléchi, conclu que tu devais le préférer. Et j’ai fait téléphoner. La réponse a été : Partie pour dîner en ville, on ne sait pas où. J’ai pensé que c’était une manière d’éviter le triste gêneur que je suis. Et j’ai renoncé à sortir et à m’habiller. Maintenant, je me dis que c’est peut-être un peu trop pessimiste de ma part d’avoir conclu cela et j’envoie un mot pour demander la visite chez moi. Je ne sais quelle sera la réponse. a toi.
Marcel”

Confident of Marcel Proust’s creative years, Louis Suchet d’Albufera is descendant from the Marshal of Empire by his father and Lucien Bonaparte by his mother, a Cambacérès. Marquis and then Duke (1925) of Albufera, he married in October 1904 a Masséna allied with the Ney and Murat. Marcel Proust seems to have met him in 1903, through Bertrand de Fénelon or Antoine Bibesco: they then forged a sincere friendship that, despite the writer’s complex character, lasted more than fifteen years. Although Marcel Proust sometimes made him feel little or not his own intellectual superiority, he recognized his qualities of heart, and showed himself with him of great kindness- despite some unjust outbursts. Louis d’Albufera was for a long time his closest friend after Reynaldo Hahn: they shared their most intimate joys and sorrows, and Marcel Proust was admitted in the secret of the Marquis’ relationship with a young woman of the half-world, Louisa de Mornand