“I was so much in the habit of having Albertine with me, and now I suddenly saw a new aspect of Habit. Hitherto I had regarded it chiefly as an annihilating force which suppresses the originality and even the awareness of one’s perceptions; now I saw it as a dread deity, so riveted to one’s being, its insignificant face so incrusted in one’s heart, that if it detaches itself, if it turns away from one, this deity that one had barely distinguished inflicts on one sufferings more terrible than any other and is then as cruel as death itself.”

Habit has been a reoccurring theme through out the different volumes. In the first Volume it was the narrators habit of endearment from his mother for bed time. During that point, I wasn’t sure if it was for the habit of “routine, a bed time story, a good night kiss” or if it was just the habit of seeing his mothers face as the last person before he shut his eyes. Then as the book goes deeper, the habit grows deeper as well. To me the theme outlines neurotic habits, i didn’t see the anxiety of the habits when the narrator was younger and wanted nothing but his mothers kiss goodnight. But when he gets older, the understanding of the habit grows as well. Which brings me to the reason why I picked this quote, because it shows the development of the narrators understanding of not only habit but habit as a whole (himself, the habits and the people he associates with the habits)