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Six pages from the galley proof for Marcel Proust's 'À l'ombre des jeunes filles en fleurs [In the Shadow of Young Girls in Flower],' the second volume of A La Recherche du Temps Perdu [In Search of Lost Time, or Remembrance of Things Past], 6 x 6.25 to 6 x 7.75, with a few corrections to two pages made in Proust's own hand. The first five pages, irregularly paginated "132" and "134" through "137," discuss Odette’s salon and her relationship with Madame Verdurin, beginning with Swann’s stipulation that Odette must cease visiting the "petit clan" after their marriage. On the first page "132," Proust adds two handwritten marginal amendments: "Monsieur Swann n'apprécierait pas beaucoup que j'y fréquente et mon fidèle époux" and "elle se fit même prier des visited…qu'elle faisait des années à Odette et lui ait ainsi ôté la satisfaction de."
A later page, marked "311," consists of two sections pasted together at the center, and carries reflections on Platonic pleasure in unattainable objects, belonging to the context of the narrator's encounter with "petite Simonet." In the upper right, Proust amends a line to begin: "Si le désir que tel jour." In the left margin, he pens a slightly longer passage, ending: "il nous est impossible de la voir." In overall very good to fine condition, with a tear to the bottom margin of page 132.
The first proofs for 'À l'ombre des jeunes filles en fleurs' were printed for Grasset in 1914, but World War I delayed the publication. Proust took this opportunity to correct his text—reworking it by literally cutting and pasting, crossing out proper names and entire sentences, and hand-writing various corrections in the margins. Critic Pierre Clarac observes that Proust modified his manuscript 'into an extraordinary marquetry where large autograph fragments alternate with proofs, corrected or not, some of which date back to 1914 and others of which were established with a view to the publication of 1918.' The book finally debuted in June 1919, published by Gallimard, and it was awarded the prestigious Prix Goncourt that December.
