174 MARCEL PROUST

tion was captured by the chief theme of the first movement, a

mediocre but haunting melody whose only musical merit is its

simplicity, and whose fascination comes from its very banaliry, like

that of a popular song or dance-tune, and its incessant repetition.

ViOl~g.flr r'le-flt" rl r F'i r "ittl nfll

p dolce espressivp

Afterwards, in Reynaldo's room at 6 Rue du Cirque, with its

enormous stone fireplace, or in the dining-room at 9 Boulevard

Malesherbes, Proust would say: "Play me that bit I like, Reynaldo

-you know, the 'little phrase'." So the little phrase of Saint-

Saens became the 'national anthem' of his love for Reynaldo, as

Vinteuil's became that of Swann's love for Odette.l

1 1,218. In Jean Santeuil the hero's mistress, Fran!toise S., plays the Saint-

Saens sonata under its own name, during an episode of jealous cross-

examination about her Lesbian loves which is retold in A fa Recherche both

of Swann and Odette, and of the Narrator and Albertine. So it may be

conjectured that there is something of Proust's friendship for Reynaldo in

both Franc;oise and Albertine. Perhaps, too (though here the transposition

would be particularly devious and dubious), since Albertine and the Sonata

are associated through MIle Vinteuil and her friend with homosexual

jealousy, it may be guessed that Proust quarrelled with Reynaldo-over his

loyal attachment to his master Saint-Saens, who, as was notorious, was

himself an invert. Another probable relic of Reynaldo in Fran<;oise S. is the

episode of her musician friends, Vesale, Saint-Geron and Griffon, who

perform chamber-music in her apartment, with Franc;oise at the piano. But

at this point in their friendship no more than the possibility of some relation

between Frar..ioise and Reynaldo can be inferred, and no definite conclusions

about events in real life between Hahn and Proust can be drawn from such

uncertain material. Indeed, the evidence against the connection is more

convincing. The scene of jealousy had already appeared in Avant fa nuit,

written a year before Proust met Hahn. Fran~oise is much less closely allied

to Albertine than to Odette in Un Amour de Swann, who derives from a

very different region of Proust's life, from his flirtation with Mme Hayman,

his discoveries about the early life of Charles Haas, and most of all from his

imagination, for Un Amour de Swann is the only episode of A la Recherche

in which there is a large element of fiction. Proust's early association with

Hahn seems to have been free from quarrels, or any unhappiness except his

intermittent feelings of guilt towards his unsuspecting mother. Its passionate

stage ended two years later, when Proust found another young friend, and

a brief period of tension was followed by a loyal and lifelong comradeship.

Except for the few angry months in 1896 which ended their love, nothing

could be further from this most satisfactory and lasting of all Prous,',

friendships than the torments inflicted by Fran~oise and Albf'..rtine.