But on most evenings at this hour I could count on finding the Duchess at home, and I was glad of this, for it was more convenient for the purpose of discussing at length the particulars that Albertine required. And I would go down almost without thinking how extraordinary it was that I should be calling upon that mysterious Mme de Guermantes of my boyhood simply in order to make use of her for a practical purpose as one makes use of a telephone, a supernatural instrument before whose miracles we used to stand amazed, and which we now employ without giving it a thought, to summon our tailor or to order an ice cream. . . .
But the dress did not prevent me from thinking of the woman. Indeed, Mme de Guermantes seemed to me at this time more attractive than in the days when I was still in love with her. Expecting less of her (I no longer went to visit her for her own sake), it was almost with the relaxed negligence one exhibits when alone, with my feet on the fender, that I listened to her as thought I were reading a book written in the language of long ago. I was sufficiently detached to enjoy in what she said that pure charm of the French language which we no longer find either in the speech or in the writing of the present day.
Marcel Proust, The Captive, pp. 24-27
One aspect of Proust's life has come full circle. Marcel starts visiting Mme de Guermantes to get her advice on dresses for Albertine. Once upon a time, as we remember from earlier in Remembrance of Things Past, Marcel used to arrange his day solely so that he could walk by her in the street. Now the world has turned and his social status has climbed and hers has fallen, and he is free to swing by and see her and pick her brains. He admits, "Indeed, Mme de Guermantes seemed to me at this time more attractive than in the days when I was still in love with her." Sometimes, although rarely, you reach a position of friendship and balance with an ex-lover where you can talk about current ones, although that's pretty damn rare. Oddly, I think I actually have several women in my life who made that transition from lover to confidante, which a combination of very good luck and the fact that I've usually (although sadly not always) been very honest with the women who have passed through my life, and with the ones whose life I have passed through. Of course, the situation here is quite different because Mme de Guermantes was never in love with Marcel, and as far as we know have been completely obvious to his boyhood crush on her. At this point in her life she may have just enjoyed the company of a young man who paid her attention. I guess its the romantic in me, but I imagine that she had some inkling of his infatuation.
This odd little sequence, which actually, and typically for Proust, carries on for several pages, also brings us back to the nature of the relationship between Marcel and Albertine, and for that matter of the sexes during that age. Marcel is essentially, much like Jimmy Stewart in Vertigo, dressing Albertine like a doll. Very few things are more fraught with potential disaster than buying clothes for the woman in your life, and the thought of picking out an entire wardrobe fills me with dread. Having said that, this was a century ago and women were often, although obviously not always, forced to take an inert position in society.
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