698
LOUIS AUCHINCLOSS
prehensive a study of the social world. In fact, it stands so
above its nearest competitors as to seem in retrospect almost
the only picture of society in
all
of literature. Most people who
write about society, whether they be novelists or sociologists
or simply gossip columnists, make the basic error of assuming
that there must be some consistency in its standards. They take
for granted that there are rules which govern the qualifications
of those seeking admission, that if one has been gently born or
if one can play polo or excel at cards or if one has the gift
of pleasing or is a good shot or a good conversationalist, one
may tap with confidence at any closed gates. When the rules
are seen not to apply, the observer concludes that they once
did, but have since broken down.
As
the cases of non–
application multiply, he is apt to shrug in frustration and say:
"Oh, well, nowadays, it's only a question of money!"
What Proust alone had the patience to piece out is that
any society will apply all known standards together or individ–
ually, or in any combination needed to include a maverick who
happens to please or to exclude an otherwise acceptable person
who happens not to. Nor are society people conscious of the
least inconsistency in acting so. They keep no records, and
they have no written constitution. Why should their rules
be
defined in any way other than by a list of exceptions to them?
Proust understood this with the clarity of one who had suc–
ceeded in being accepted. There is a delightful passage in which
he describes how the Baron de Charlus never hesitates to
reverse himself.
If
a nobleman with whom he has quarreled
happens to come of an ancient family possessed of a recent
dukedom, the precedence of the dukedom becomes everything,
the family nothing. "The Montesquiou are descended from
an old family?" he snorts. "What would that prove, supposing
that it were proved? They have descended so far that they have
reached the fourteenth storey below stairs."
If,
on the contrary,
he has quarreled with a gentleman possessed of an ancient duke–
dom, but to whom
this
distinction has come without any length
