The Truth About Tristrem Varick · Chapter
XII explained
Tristrem Varick travels across the Atlantic, forming acquaintances with an English artist named Ledyard Yorke and a vivacious young woman.
What happens
Tristrem Varick travels across the Atlantic, forming acquaintances with an English artist named Ledyard Yorke and a vivacious young woman. As the ship nears Ireland, Tristrem becomes melancholic and contemplates the sea's allure, but is pulled back by thoughts of his beloved. The young woman attempts to comfort him, but he rebuffs her advances. Yorke discusses art and love, and Tristrem defends his idealistic view of love. Upon disembarking, the young woman bids him farewell with a cryptic insult.
Themes in this chapter
Love and Idealism
Tristrem's unwavering devotion to his beloved, rejecting the advances of the young woman and defending the ideal of exclusive love against Yorke's more pragmatic views.
Suffering and Redemption
Tristrem's melancholic contemplation of the sea as a tempting escape from his emotional turmoil, and his subsequent return to hope.
Characters to notice
- Tristrem Varick
Travels to Europe, becomes melancholic near the Irish coast, contemplates the sea's allure, rebuffs the young woman's advances, and defends his idealistic view of love.
- Ledyard Yorke
An English artist and cultivated fellow who criticizes academic art, discusses his search for a Sphinx model, and debates the nature of love with Tristrem.
- The Girl
A vivacious young woman, rumored to be an ex-star of the Gaiety, who flirts with Tristrem and attempts to comfort him, but is rebuffed. She bids him goodbye with a cryptic insult.
Key passages
“There is nothing sweeter, it seemed to say, nothing swifter, and naught more still. I feed my lovers on lotus and Lethe. There is no fairer couch in the world than mine. A sister's kiss is not more chaste. I am better than fame, serener than hope; I am more than love, I am peace. I am unforsakable, and I never forsake.”
The sea appears to promise Tristrem a peaceful, eternal escape from his troubles, offering a seductive alternative to his worldly cares.
Tristrem's personification of the sea as a tempting, almost romantic force that lures him toward oblivion.
“Aimer est le grand point, qu' importe la maitresse? Qu' importe le flacon, pourvu qu'on ait l'ivresse?”
The important thing is to love; the identity of the beloved or the vessel doesn't matter as long as one experiences the intoxication of love.
Yorke quotes de Musset to argue that love itself is paramount, regardless of the object.
“It is the speech of a man who can think himself in love over and over again, and who discovers in the end that through all his affairs he has loved no one but himself.”
Tristrem criticizes de Musset's line as the rationalization of a narcissist who mistakes self-love for genuine affection.
Tristrem defends his idealistic view of love against Yorke's more libertine philosophy.