Morel
A servant’s son who ends the novel respectable: his reputation climbs almost without interruption while the scenes he is in expose him.
32 appearing passages
Character dossiers
Three retrospective readings of strength, with the evidence and passages behind them.
Advantage standings
Fitted tendency to fare better in this lens, ordered by score. Sparse evidence can yield high scores. Each character’s endpoint is their last comparison, not a shared end-of-book date. No numbered rank or calibrated win probability is implied.
Showing the character-card cast only. This is an editorial selection, not a rating or evidence threshold.
23 matching scored · 0 matching unrated · 10 scored characters shown
Rachel
From the twenty-franc girl in a brothel to the celebrated actress reciting for the duchesse: the steepest climb in the cast, and one the scenes never quite endorse.
43 appearing passages
le narrateur
Nearly every scene passes through him and most of them go against him, yet his standing grows and his welcome never runs out.
316 appearing passages
Odette
The cocotte who ends as Mme de Forcheville and the duke’s last mistress: her standing rises across the book while the scenes she is in keep exposing her.
142 appearing passages
Robert de Saint-Loup
The brilliant friend whose scenes hold level while his reputation rises, most of all after his death.
168 appearing passages
Swann
Measured more often than anyone but the narrator, and measured losing: his standing erodes from Combray on, though his scenes end better than they began.
202 appearing passages
Albertine
The girl of the little band at Balbec, then the captive, then the memory: every reading of her slides downward, steepest after her death.
146 appearing passages
baron de Charlus
The greatest fall in the book: scenes and standing decline from the Guermantes salons to the wartime brothel, while belonging never wavers.
119 appearing passages
duchesse de Guermantes
Oriane at the height of her wit in the Guermantes volumes, and afterward a slow decline in every reading at once.
199 appearing passages
Mme de Villeparisis
The old friend from Balbec whose matinée is one of the novel’s great social machines, and who ends as a tiresome foreigner in a Venice hotel.
79 appearing passages
Françoise
Sovereign of the Combray kitchen, and thereafter a sovereign losing territory: her scenes begin higher than almost anyone’s and drift downward as the household moves to Paris.
82 appearing passages
Mme Verdurin
The Patronne who wins the long war and ends as princesse de Guermantes, and who is never, in any reading, actually seated.
82 appearing passages
Gilberte
Swann’s daughter, then Mlle de Forcheville, then the marquise de Saint-Loup: she moves steadily inward while her scenes recede from the radiance of Combray.
76 appearing passages
Norpois
The ambassador whom every voice finds tedious, and who never once loses a room he takes seriously.
63 appearing passages
la grand-mère
The one reading in the book that keeps rising after death: her scenes carry her upward from Combray, and the memory of her carries her higher still.
80 appearing passages
Bloch
Cut by nearly every scene he appears in, and rising all the while: the schoolfriend ends the novel as Jacques du Rozier, a celebrated author.
71 appearing passages
duc de Guermantes
The great lord whose scenes go against him from the start and whose standing follows: a Guermantes eclipsed by the end of the book.
110 appearing passages
docteur Cottard
The punster of the little clan whose scenes go modestly his way and gently improve, while his standing never rises to match.
43 appearing passages
la mère du narrateur
The mother of the goodnight kiss: her scenes hold steady from Combray to Venice, and her belonging stands higher than anyone’s.
40 appearing passages
Bergotte
The writer the narrator worshipped before meeting him: the man disappoints, and the scenes carry him steadily upward anyway.
36 appearing passages
Legrandin
The snob of Combray, undone by the narrator’s flat verdict, whose scant standing rises regardless: by the end he has the title he pretended to despise.
24 appearing passages
Mme de Cambremer (née Legrandin)
Legrandin’s sister, married into a name the Guermantes do not rate: the lowest standing of anyone here, and falling, in scenes that ridicule her from Saint-Euverte’s to Balbec.
20 appearing passages
M. Vinteuil
Combray’s humiliated piano teacher, canonized after his death: the novel demotes the man and then exalts the artist.
15 appearing passages