Doctor Cottard

Cottard began as a hesitant, over-eager young man whom the Verdurins took up and made fashionable, and he repaid them with a loyalty that survives every change in their fortunes. In public he has learned to wear an icy professional mask, complete with cutting remarks and a shaved face, but among the faithful he reverts to the punning, eager self they first befriended. His career is a small parable of how Parisian society manufactures eminence, and his devotion to the clan shows how much a man will pay for the illusion of belonging.