Albertine

Albertine, fictional character, the mistress of Marcel, narrator of À la recherche du temps perdu (1913–27; Remembrance of Things Past, or In Search of Lost Time) by Marcel Proust. She appears in several volumes of the seven-part novel, notably À l’ombre des jeunes filles en fleurs (1919; Within a Budding Grove), Sodome et Gomorrhe (1921–22; Sodom and Gomorrah), and La Prisonnière (1923; The Captive).

Albertine Simonet and Marcel (Proust gives no surname to the character) meet at Balbec, a seaside resort, when she is a young girl and then again when she is a sophisticated young woman. Although they live together in Paris, she engages in clandestine lesbian affairs. Marcel is obsessively possessive of Albertine, demands her complete attention, and is tortured by suspicions of her affairs. Unable to bear his jealousy, Albertine goes to Touraine. Marcel feels he cannot live without her and writes her, begging for her return. He receives a letter from her aunt, informing him that Albertine was killed in an accidental fall from a horse.