Élie de Kertanguy

Use in the book

Élie’s two explicit appearances show friendship as a practice of moving together between levels of thought. In March the friends travel imaginatively through Cooper’s America, then return to the ferment of European society and the immensity of thought before God. They end by resolving to place their own usefulness above an idle private happiness. Guérin emphasizes the restorative effect of the conversation upon his weak and wavering spirits. In May the occasion is humbler: the two gather young beech leaves to eat. Guérin feels compunction about destroying their brief lives, although his hand continues the damage. Their talk again brings relief, and the promise to gather leaves another time becomes an understood allusion to renewing it. The friend therefore belongs both to high conversation and to an ordinary shared act in the garden. These contexts matter more for the journal than the editor’s brief biographical supplement. The name Élie must not be confused with a reference to the biblical prophet, and the separately printed initial E... is not automatically an expanded occurrence of his name.

Places to read

1. 6 March 1833 · ¶1The conversation joins imaginative travel, Europe’s social ferment, and reflection on thought before God.
2. 6 March 1833 · ¶3The friends resolve to choose the place where they can do most good, even at the cost of idle personal happiness.
3. 6 March 1833 · ¶4The conversation renews Guérin’s wavering strength and ends in an unfamiliar sweetness identified with hope.
4. 9 May 1833 · ¶1Gathering beech leaves provides the occasion and later shorthand for a relieving conversation.

Translation in this edition

Source note S1 gives the full name and a death year. The entry of March 24 prints E..., without an attached identification of that initial; it is retained as unresolved here.