But while each of these attachments, each of these flirtations had been
the realisation, more or less complete, of a dream born of the sight of a
face or a form which Swann had spontaneously, and without effort on his
part, found charming, it was quite another matter when, one day at the
theatre, he was introduced to Odette de Crecy by an old friend of his own,
who had spoken of her to him as a ravishing creature with whom he might
very possibly come to an understanding; but had made her out to be harder
of conquest than she actually was, so as to appear to be conferring a
special favour by the introduction. She had struck Swann not, certainly,
as being devoid of beauty, but as endowed with a style of beauty which
left him indifferent, which aroused in him no desire, which gave him,
indeed, a sort of physical repulsion; as one of those women of whom every
man can name some, and each will name different examples, who are the
converse of the type which our senses demand. To give him any pleasure her
profile was too sharp, her skin too delicate, her cheek-bones too
prominent, her features too tightly drawn.
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