During this weeks reading of Time Regained I found Proust’s musings on morality and human nature to be quite intriguing. The narrator of Time Regained describes some of his characters as being rather two faced in both their actions and emotions. One character which spring instantly to mind is M. de Charlus(the Barron). M. de Charlus is described multiple times by the narrator to be “at heart -very kind(166).” The narrator believes that the katy exterior which M. de Charlus can some time display is false, and that within him he has no real malice. Yet, some time after the Baron’s death, Marcel discovers a letter of confession from him. The letter days that Morel was right to not come and visit him after their falling out because if he had, he would have killed him: He was, in resisting my appeals, the instrument of divine wisdom, for I was resolved, had he come, that he should not leave my house alive. One of the two of us had to disappear. I had decided to kill him(168).” This information begs the question, was M. de Charlus a good person who pretended to be unkind, or was he a bad person who fooled people like marcel into thinking his snide behavior was all part of an act? Maybe it is neither? Perhaps the point of M. de Charlus is to simply be a caricature of the human condition, and expressed that people can be capable of great kindness and great cruelty. Even Morel, who says that he fears the Baron, and that Marcel does not know him as he does(166), says almost in the same breath “Good heavens, yes! I know he is kind. And Wonderfully considerate, and honest(166).”

The irony in the moral contradictions of people is perhaps the most explicit in the brothel scene of Time Regained. The young men working at the brothel take on the role of criminal for the pleasure of their customers, who are aroused and delighted at the idea that they are fraternising with a murderer or thief, but becomes outraged at the idea that such men could tell a lie, namely the lie that they are criminals. “The client, in his naivety, is astounded, for with his arbitrary conception of the gigolo, while he gets a thrill of delight from the numerous murders of which he believes him to be guilty, he is horrified by any simple contradiction or lie which he detects in his words(195).”

On a grander scale, the narrator points out the peculiarities in how people weigh different moral values. On page 204 of Time Regained the narrator looks at how patriotism might be compared to sexual virtue: “There was a page-boy from a hotel who was absolutely terrified because of all the money the Baron offered him if he would go to his house! …The boy, who in fact only cares about women, was reassured when he understood what was wanted of him. Hearing all these promises of money, he had taken the baron for a spy. And he was greatly relieved when he realized that he was being asked to sell not his country but his body, is is possibly not a more moral thing to do, but less dangerous, and in any case easier.” In this selection of reading it is safe to say that sexual deviance(according to the period), though still considered wrong, was not nearly as heinous an act as betraying one’s country. The greater danger of treason insinuates that moral responsibilities toward one’s country trump moral responsibilities to the self.

Francoise, Marcel’s servant, is also contradictory in her display of moral character. The clearest example I can come up with is her display of compassion. Francoise is intense in her display of empathy and compassion when the victim of a cruel world is not within her presence, and “she parades her grief(229).” Yet, when the suffering individual is in her presence, she displays and air of disdain. At the death of Robert Francoise, who hadn’t thought much of him in life, “descanted upon the memory of the dead man with frenzied threnodies and lamentations(229).” When given the opportunity to put her sympathy for the dead to some use, by comforting marcel, she instead becomes uncomfortable and turns away from him. The narrator claims this is not a trait significant to Francoise, but to many “emotional people.” Her behavior reminds me of a quote from page 154 of the book when Marcel is discussing the possible destruction of a statute which M. de Charlus describes as an “affirmation of faith and energy.” Marcel corrects him: “You mean it’s symbol, Monsieur, and I adore certain symbols no less than you do. But it would be absurd to sacrifice to the symbol the reality that it symbolizes.” This is what I would say Francoise is doing, she puts all her energy into projecting the appearance of empathy, but when it is time to put it into action, she is cold and aloof.

The idea of sacrificing reality to the symbol may be a problem as universal as having a conflicted sense of morality. I do not believe that these are new problems, but I can not help but wonder if the rise of the middle class, which during lecture has been described as the dawn of “keeping up appearances,” might have exacerbated our sense that moral symbolism was more important than moral reality.