The Yellow Wall

Proust and Vermeer’s View of Delft

Among the innumerable shortcomings of this world and its inhabitants, which I blame on whomever created them, there’s a continuous display of sloppiness and shiftlessness, so enthusiastically relentless as to border on deliberate mockery.

I’ve always found amazing how one of the pillars of Western civilisation is a book – nay, the Book – based on the premise of a perfect and all-powerful Supreme Being who made humankind in his image and likeness.

Sorry, but I’m not having that. If my work as a translator were of the same quality as his as a creator, my editors would want to slap me in the face as hard as possible, while my clients would leave scathing reviews on my job.

If I were the one in charge, on the other hand, this world would enjoy a cold temperate climate, and run like a mix between a Nordic konditori, a Protestant Heaven and a Socialist-with-free-enterprise Utopia. A more crowded, diverse Scandinavia, basically, with fewer alcoholic beverages but plenty of pastries for all. Do you agree with me that that would be a good thing? Discuss.

But I don’t want to be argumentative for argument’s sake. For a more sophisticated and in-depth analysis of the “what” and “why” of Atheism, I refer you to Richard Dawkins.

While the pursuit of perfection may prove more of a hindrance than a help, and slow down the pace of action, there is a lot to be said for striving for accuracy and precision. Not only is a job thoroughly done a sign of self-respect and basic human decency, for those of us who care about such things, it’s a small step in bending the long arc of the moral universe toward justice.

In order to find consolation on this haphazard, random, disorganised planet of ours, I appeal to the higher powers of Art and Literature.

You can find one of the more poignant and profound thoughts about the value of a world based on kindness, scrupulousness, self-sacrifice, of a beauty (…) sufficient in itself, in this excerpt from La Prisonnière (The Captive), in Marcel Proust’s A la recherche du temps perdu: the elderly writer Bergotte, who’s visiting a Dutch art exhibit, falls ill and dies, while admiring Vermeer’s View of Delft. A detail in particular had captured his attention and his final thoughts – le petit pan de mur jaune, the little patch of yellow wall in the painting.

View of Delft, Johannes Vermeer c. 1660-1663, Mauritshuis, The Hague. The little patch of yellow wall is somewhere on the far right side

You can read this passage in the following English version – Remembrance of Things Past, 3 vols., trans. C. K. Scott Moncrieff, T. Kilmartin, and A. Mayor (New York, 1982):

(…) a little patch of yellow wall* (…) was so well painted that it was, if one looked at it by itself, like some priceless specimen of Chinese art, of a beauty that was sufficient in itself (…) He walked past several pictures and was struck by the aridity and pointlessness of such an artificial kind of art, which was greatly inferior to the sunshine of a windswept Venetian palazzo, or of an ordinary house by the sea. At last he came to the Vermeer which he remembered as more striking, more different from anything else he knew, but in which, thanks to the critic's article, he noticed for the first time some small figures in blue, that the sand was pink, and, finally, the precious substance of the tiny patch of yellow wall. His dizziness increased; he fixed his gaze, like a child upon a yellow butterfly that it wants to catch, on the precious little patch of wall. "That's how I ought to have written," he said. "My last books are too dry, I ought to have gone over them with a few layers of colour, made my language precious in itself, like this little patch of yellow wall." Meanwhile he was not unconscious of the gravity of his condition. In a celestial pair of scales there appeared to him, weighing down one the pans, his own life, while the other contained the little patch of wall so beautifully painted in yellow. He felt that he had rashly sacrificed the former for the latter. (…) He was dead. Dead for ever? Who can say? Certainly, experiments in spiritualism offer us no more proof than the dogmas of religion that the soul survives death. All that we can say is that everything is arranged in this life as though we entered it carrying a burden of obligations contracted in a former life; there is no reason inherent in the conditions of life on this earth that can make us consider ourselves obliged to do good, to be kind and thoughtful, even to be polite, nor for an atheist artist to consider himself obliged to begin over again a score of times a piece of work the admiration aroused by which will matter little to his worm-eaten body, like the patch of yellow wall painted with so much skill and refinement by an artist destined to be for ever unknown and barely identified under the name Vermeer. All these obligations, which have no sanction in our present life, seem to belong to a different world, a world based on kindness, scrupulousness, self-sacrifice, a world entirely different from this one and which we leave in order to be born on this earth, before perhaps returning there to live once again beneath sway of those unknown laws which we obeyed because we bore their precepts in our hearts, not knowing whose hand had traced them there—those laws to which every profound work of the intellect brings us nearer and which are invisible only—if then!—to fools.

*From Essential Vermeer, a treasure trove of all things Vermeer: This passage is often cited as an example of Proust's ability to explore the intricate connections between art, perception, and personal memory. Proust appreciated Vermeer's ability to find beauty in ordinary, everyday scenes. He saw in Vermeer's work an affirmation of the idea that the mundane could be elevated to the level of art, mirroring Proust's own examination of the significance of seemingly trivial moments in life.

Here’s the original French version:

(…) un petit pan de mur jaune (…) était si bien peint, qu'il était, si on le regardait seul, comme une précieuse oeuvre d'art chinoise, d'une beauté qui se suffirait à elle-même (…) Il passa devant plusieurs tableaux et eut l'impression de la sécheresse et de l'inutilité d'un art si factice, et qui ne valait pas les courants d'air et de soleil d'un palazzo de Venise, ou d'une simple maison au bord de la mer. Enfin il fut devant le Ver Meer, qu'il se rappelait plus éclatant, plus différent de tout ce qu'il connaissait, mais où, grâce à l'article du critique, il remarqua pour la première fois des petits personnages en bleu, que le sable était rose, et enfin la précieuse matière du tout petit pan de mur jaune. Ses étourdissements augmentaient ; il attachait son regard, comme un enfant à un papillon jaune qu'il veut saisir, au précieux petit pan de mur. «C'est ainsi que j'aurais dû écrire, disait-il. Mes derniers livres sont trop secs, il aurait fallu passer plusieurs couches de couleur, rendre ma phrase en elle même précieuse, comme ce petit pan de mur jaune.» (…) Il était mort. Mort à jamais? Qui peut le dire ? Certes, les expériences spirites, pas plus que les dogmes religieux, n'apportent la preuve que l'âme subsiste. Ce qu’on peut dire, c’est que tout se passe dans notre vie comme si nous y entrions avec le faix d’obligations contractées dans une vie antérieure; il n'y a aucune raison, dans nos conditions de vie sur cette terre, pour que nous nous croyions obligés à faire le bien, à être délicats, même à être polis, ni pour l'artiste cultivé à ce qu'il se croie obligé de recommencer vingt fois un morceau dont l'admiration qu'il excitera importera peu à son corps mangé par les vers, comme le pan de mur jaune que peignit avec tant de science et de raffinement un artiste à jamais inconnu, à peine identifié sous le nom de Ver Meer. Toutes ces obligations, qui n'ont pas leur sanction dans la vie présente, semblent appartenir à un monde différent, fondé sur la bonté, le scrupule, le sacrifice, un monde entièrement différent de celui-ci, et dont nous sortons pour naître à cette terre, avant peut-être d'y retourner revivre sous l'empire de ces lois inconnues auxquelles nous avons obéi parce que nous en portions l'enseignement en nous, sans savoir qui les y avait tracées – ces lois dont tout travail profond de l'intelligence nous rapproche et qui sont invisibles seulement – et encore! – pour les sots.

And now for a bit of nerdview (great word!). Notice how artiste cultivé has been translated as atheist artist in the English version above. In another English translation, we find talented artist, which is closer in meaning to the French term, but not quite yet, in that talented refers to an innate gift, whereas cultivé goes a step further – an inborn ability, bolstered by learning and apprenticeship.

Why did those translators (and their editor) conspicuously choose atheist, instead of expert, skilled, accomplished? Did they assume that the part in which Proust writes “there is no reason inherent in the conditions of life on this earth that can make us consider ourselves obliged to do good, to be kind and thoughtful, even to be polite”, and the subsequently mentioned “worm-eaten body” were self-evident of the artist’s lack of religious belief? But isn’t that an alteration of Proust’s intentions? Haven’t they gone too far in their own interpretation?

I’m interested in your opinions, so feel free to leave a comment, not necessarily in English, but in Italian or French, if you feel more confident to write in your mother tongue.

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