Marcel Proust sends his condolences in memory of the death of Paul Hervieu.

Marcel Proust (1871.1922)

Autographed letter signed to Baroness Aimery Harty de Pierrebourg.

Three pages in-8°. 102 bd Haussmann. December 29 [1915]

Kolb, Volume XIV, pages 325-326.

"An autumn rose is more exquisite than any other."

Marcel Proust sends his greetings tinged with the memory of the death of Paul Hervieu, the deceased lover of his correspondent.

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“Madam, In these days of renewal when wounds hurt more deeply, I think of you, whom this past year has so cruelly wounded. I did not know your mother, Madame, nor your son. But I knew the incomparable friend who had received this unique privilege, as unusual in the realm of spirits as in the plant world, having borne so many bitter, sweet, and nourishing fruits, of retaining the grace, the freshness, the rosy petals of a flower. So much so that one can say, despite the orchards laden with its fruit, now at its fullest ripeness, that it was still in bloom that, on a mysterious night of war, and silently like a flower, it was cut down. ‘An autumn rose is more exquisite than any other’ [line by Agrippa d’Aubigné] . This one was still summer. A human rose, alas, and one over which many tears are shed.” Tell your daughter and Georges that I am thinking of them deeply, and please accept, Madam, my sincere respects. Marcel Proust.