Proust's great generosity towards his friends is legendary. Several anecdotes evoke this, the most famous of which is undoubtedly that which Jean Cocteau recounts in the tribute published by the Nouvelle Revue Française on January 1st 1923: "I was leaving the Hotel Ritz with Proust. He had distributed in tips, according to his heart, all the money he had in his pocket. When he got to the doorman, he noticed this and asked him if he could borrow 50 francs. He added, as the doorman hurriedly opened his wallet, 'Keep it, it was for you'. Another example: in 1913, when Proust offered a precious ring from the Fontana jewellers to his friend Louis de Robert, to thank him for the help he was giving him in the rereading of Swann's Way, he wrote to him: "it is a worthless thing, you can lose it without scruples, provided you ask me for another one.
The present brochure is devoted to one of the illustrations of this formidable generosity, since it is the clock that Proust gave to his friend Gabriel de La Rochefoucauld on the occasion of his wedding in February 1905. This beautiful object, in whose choice some may see Proust's attachment to questions related to the passage of time, had remained in the family of the bride and groom for over a hundred years. In a remarkable mise en abyme, the clock has now joined the collections of the Maison de tante Léonie - Musée Marcel Proust thanks to the generosity of a private patron, whom I thank most warmly. My thanks also go to François de Ricqlès and Jean de La Rochefoucauld for the texts they kindly wrote for this brochure, on the clock itself and on Gabriel de La Rochefoucauld respectively.     

Jérôme Bastianelli
President of the Société des amis de Marcel Proust
et les amis de Combray

Format: 14.8 x 21 cm
Number of pages : 42
Binding : Glued square back