Two or three times it occurred to me, for a moment, that the world in which this room and these bookshelves were situated, and in which Albertine counted for so little, was perhaps an intellectual world, which was the sole reality, and my grief something like what we feel when we read a novel, a thing of which only a madman would make a lasting and permanent grief that prolonged itself through his life; that a tiny flicker of my will would suffice, perhaps, to attain to this real world, to re-enter it by breaking through my grief as one breaks through a paper hoop, and to think no more about what Albertine had done than we think about the actions of the imaginary heroine of a novel after we have finished reading it. For that matter, the mistresses whom I have loved most passionately have never coincided with my love for them. That love was genuine, since I subordinated everything else to seeing them, keeping them for myself alone, and would weep aloud if, one evening, I had waited for them in vain. But it was more because they had the faculty of arousing that love, of raising it to a paroxysm, than because they were its image. When I saw them, when I heard their voices, I could find nothing in them which resembled my love and could account for it. And yet my sole joy lay in seeing them, my sole anxiety in waiting for them to come. It was as though a virtue that had no connexion with them had been artificially attached to them by nature, and that this virtue, this quasi-electric power, had the effect upon me of exciting my love, that is to say of controlling all my actions and causing all my sufferings. But from this, the beauty, or the intelligence, or the kindness of these women was entirely distinct. As by an electric current that gives us a shock, I have been shaken by my loves, I have lived them, I have felt them: never have I succeeded in seeing or thinking them. Indeed I am inclined to believe that in these relationships (I leave out of account the physical pleasure which is their habitual accompaniment but is not enough in itself to constitute them), beneath the outward appearance of the woman, it is to those invisible forces with which she is incidentally accompanied that we address ourselves as to obscure deities. It is they whose good will is necessary to us, with whom we seek to establish contact without finding any positive pleasure in it. The woman herself, during our assignation with her, does little more than put us in touch with these goddesses. We have, by way of oblation, promised jewels and travels, uttered incantations which mean that we adore and, at the same time, contrary incantations which mean that we indifferent. We have used all our power to obtain a fresh assignation, but one that is accorded to us without constraint. Would we in fact go to so much trouble for the woman herself, if she were not complemented by these occult forces, considering that, once she has left us, we are unable to say how she was dressed and realise that we never even looked at her?
Marcel Proust, Cities of the Plain, pp. 1164-1165
As my most excellent friend Mike Kelly would opine, Proust just laid some truth on us. Proust is reflecting upon why Marcel loves Albertine - and, for that matter, why any of us love the women in our lives. This is especially vexing because "once she has left us, we are unable to say how she was dressed and realise that we never even looked at her?" This is a tough question, and one that we can seldom figure out, and I suspect that Proust would have argued that it is beyond rational analysis. He points out, "I have been shaken by my loves, I have lived them, I have felt them: never have I succeeded in seeing or thinking them." If love is not something we can see or think about - or to think of it another way, physically quantify or rationally conceive - then is it truly something beyond the confines of this tangible world? For the present Proust leaves out the sexual realm: "the physical pleasure which is their habitual accompaniment but is not enough in itself to constitute them." Instead, he notes, "Indeed I am inclined to believe that in these relationships . . . beneath the outward appearance of the woman, it is to those invisible forces with which she is incidentally accompanied that we address ourselves as to obscure deities. It is they whose good will is necessary to us, with whom we seek to establish contact without finding any positive pleasure in it. The woman herself, during our assignation with her, does little more than put us in touch with these goddesses." It is to these invisible forces, these goddesses, that we offer jewels and travels as oblations. Now, do we believe this? And if we believe it do we instinctually know that we believe it? And if we instinctually know this does it consciously impact our pursuit of women? I don't know if any of these questions can be answered in the affirmative, and, truthfully, Proust may just be speaking metaphorically. That said, when we're lying in bed with the woman we love and are sated with post-coital endorphin tsunami, aren't we as close to a profound oneness with the mystic as we'll ever be? Maybe that the true difference between lust and love. With lust your chasing down that moment of orgasmic release, and with love your focused on the half-hour after orgasmic release.
No comments:
Post a Comment