Introduction to Bricquebec
Proust submitted his
original typescript for the first volume of À la recherche
du temps perdu to Bernard Grasset's publishing house in
1913. When it became apparent that the first volume, Du
côté de chez Swann, would run to over 700 pages Proust
agreed to cut out 200 pages, rewrite the ending of the first
volume, and move them to the second volume which he was proposing
to call Le côté de Guermantes. This episode relates
the Narrator's first visit to Balbec/Bricquebec with his
grandmother. Publication was interrupted after the printing of Du
côté de chez Swann by the First World War and the second
volume, À l'ombre des jeunes filles en fleurs, was
eventually published in 1919.
The text we have here is the original
corrected, but not proof-read, typescript of what was later to
become Noms de pays: le pays. In this original
incarnation there was as yet no mention of Albertine and the
jeunes filles en fleurs - what was to become one of the most
significant themes of the whole novel. During the years between
1914 and 1919 this episode was rewritten and extended almost
beyond recognition. There are numerous textual inconsistencies
within this early draft, names of people and places have yet to
be definitively decided upon: Balbec is called Bricquebec, but
also in places Cricquebec; Robert de Saint Loup is first called
Beauvais then Montargis; Baron de Charlus is called M. de Fleurus
(and at one point, intriguingly, Charlus); Mlle de Stermaria is
called variously Sclaria, Silaria, Silariat.
In 1989 Richard Bales published a remarkable
piece of scholarship Bricquebec: Prototype d'À l'ombre des
jeunes filles en fleurs in which he has deciphered and
reproduced the typescript including all of Proust's extensive
handwritten additions, paperoles, changes and crossings out. I
have translated this text incorporating all the corrections. Many
passages remain unaltered in the final published version, some
are moved, some are juxtaposed or reworked but still
recognizable. In these cases I have taken Terence Kilmartin's
translation and incorporated it into my own. My intention was
never to produce a "new" translation or cover ground
that had already been well covered already, simply to produce a
cohesive translation of the whole. It stands as a fascinating
glimpse into the etymology of the novel and Proust's working
methods.
Chris Taylor, 2003.