Photography, text, and the limits of representation in Marcel Proust's 'In Search of Lost Time' and Roland Barthes's 'Camera Lucida'

Abstract

This paper investigates representations of individuals produced via text and photography in Marcel Proust's 'In Search of Lost Time' and Roland Barthes's 'Camera Lucida' with special emphasis on representations of maternal figures. Writers of photography, such as Barthes and Proust, assume that the image qua image both disappoints and exceeds words; that the reproduced image will generate readings dissonant or even oppositional to the writer's own. Barthes cannot submit the picture of his mother to the scrutiny of strangers who will not see the essence of his mother he sees there; Proust offers his readers either non-existent photographs or photographs that are divorced from their referents. Writing the photographic not only protects the image from misinterpretation and misuse, but also shields writing itself from the force of the reproduced image. Fictional photographs of a grandmother and mother allow the writer to figure loss and mourning while rescuing the images of maternal figures from the reifying and loveless gaze of the public.