In a little curio shop a half-spent candle, projecting its warm glow over an engraving, reprinted it in sanguine, while, battling against the darkness, the light of a big lamp bronzed a scrap of leather, inlaid a dagger with glittering spangles, spread a film of previous gold like the patina of time or the varnish of an old master on pictures which were only bad copies, made in fact of the whole hove, in which there was nothing but pinch-beck rubbish, a marvelous composition by Rembrandt. The Guermantes Way, Part 1
I was thinking of some image like the following, sadly mislabeled as a Rembrandt. As I went looking through other Rembrandts, I could not find an interior lit that was sufficiently like Proust description though I know exactly what he means, and imagining something could not find an actual Rembrandt like the one in my or Proust's mind.
One of my favorite pastimes is walking through neighborhoods where I can look in windows as evening settles around dinner and home. A loneliness lingers, a lie I welcome–oddly comforted by the melodrama of my own lack as I walk. Some of the back streets of Brooklyn Heights offer surprising stores of window delights at night. I walked them a few times until I noticed the glimpse no longer offered a surprise as I passed by and so would have had to stop as I went, to look, thereby ruining the desired experience.
Such moments are like the panels painted centuries ago whose warmth and aged darkness bring you closer even as they keep the distance necessary for appreciation.
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