Marcel Proust: A Biography

THE EARLY YEARS OF JEAN SANTEUIL 193
to Great-Uncle Louis. Among the old man's relics he also dis-
covered a collection of photographs of pretty little, forgotten
actresses, each with a fond inscription, and kept them as a
souvenir. One was of a certain Marie van Zandt, a sweetly
innocent-looking young person in male travesty, with frilled,
knee-length pantaloons: an original of Elstir's sketch of Odette
as Miss Sacripant.^1
Next month, on 30 June, death returned to take Mme Proust's
father, Nathe Wei!. He was a square-faced, hook-nosed old man,
with clean-shaven, rat-trap lips, bristles of white beard from ear to
ear, and an expression of hard incorruptibility. It is said-and one
can almost hear the Narrator's great-aunt at Combray calling:
"Bathilde, come and stop your husband drinking cognac!"-that
he showed his good taste in wines by providing inferior stuff for
his family, while he kept a bottle of the best Bordeaux on the
floor at his feet for his own use. His reluctance to spend a night
away from home-which was inherited by his grandson-was
notorious: the only exception was during the siege of Paris in
1870-71, when he took his wife to Etampes for safety. Grand-
father W eilliked to be strict towards Marcel in his earlier youth,
but when he saw the boy in any real distress would show an un-
expected, rather touching sympathy. We need not doubt that
Nathe Weil, like M. Sandre in Jean Santeuil at the end of the
Marie Kossichef episode, shed tears when he saw Marcel in
despair over his parting with Marie de Benardaky. Proust re-
proached himself bitterly for his feeling of heartless indifference
at his grandfather's death, and was relieved to find himself, when
he entered the old man's empty room after the funeral, bursting
into uncontrollable weeping. But for Proust, despite his genuine
regret, the passing of Nathe Wei! had its compensations: he was
ab1e to tell Montesquiou, who was nagging him to attend the
inauguration of a monument to Marceline Desbordes-Valmore
at Douai on 13 July, that his mother would not hear of his 'going
to a celebration' in this time of mourning. He shamelessly begged
1 Similarly in A fa Recherche Morel, the son of Uncle Adolphe's valet,
brings the Narrator a bundle of photographs of actresses as a souvenir of the
dead man. They are inscribed ITo my best friend', and among them is a
reproduction of Elstir's portrait of Miss Sacripant (II, 264-1). MIle van
Zandt was no doubt either a relative of the Ameli. van Zandt who sang
Mignon and created the part of Lakmt! at the Opera Comique in t88), or
the same person using a different Christian name.