The Morning After

By Christmas 1914, the war hadn't ended as predicted. The trenches stretched from Switzerland to the sea. The casualty lists grew longer. The illusions died harder. Paris, though saved by the Miracle of the Marne, lived under threat. The Belle Époque seemed as remote as the Renaissance.

Yet its legacy persisted in unexpected ways. The democratic ideals it had imperfectly realized became war aims—making the world safe for democracy. The cultural innovations it had nurtured survived in exile and emigration. The social movements it had spawned continued underground. The technological advances it had celebrated found new applications. The era was gone but not vanished.

Looking back from the trenches, survivors remembered the Belle Époque with nostalgia sharpened by loss. The worldly Proust, dying in 1922, spent his last years recreating in minute detail the world that had vanished. His massive novel became the era's monument, preserving in art what time had destroyed in reality.