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“Le chagrin finit par tuer. À chaque nouvelle peine trop forte, nous sentons une veine de plus qui saillit, développe sa sinuosité mortelle au long de notre tempe, sous nos yeux. Et c’est ainsi que peu à peu se font ces terribles figures ravagées du vieux Rembrandt, du vieux Beethoven, de qui tout le monde se moquait. Et ce ne serait rien que les poches des yeux et les rides du front s’il n’y avait la souffrance du coeur.”
(Le temps retrouvé, 213)

“Unhappiness ends by killing. At every new torment which is too hard to bear we feel yet another vein protrude, to unroll its sinuous and deadly length along our temples or beneath our eyes. And thus gradually are formed those terrible ravaged faces, of the old Rembrandt, the old Beethoven, at whom the whole world mocked. And the pockets under the eyes and the wrinkled forehead would not matter much were there not also the suffering of the heart.”
(Time Regained, 314-315)


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Picture
Rembrandt Harmensz van Rijn (Dutch, 1606-1669)
Portrait of an Old Man, 1632
Oil on oak panel, 66.9 x 50.7 cm (26 5/16 x 19 15/16 in.)
Harvard Art Museums/Fogg Museum, Bequest of Nettie G. Naumburg, 1930.191

                                                                                                    All photos courtesy of Imaging Department © President and Fellows of Harvard College.