"My true friends have always given me that supreme proof of devotion, a spontaneous aversion for the man I loved"
About this Quote
Colette lands the knife with a smile: the “supreme proof of devotion” isn’t comfort, advice, or loyalty to her choices, but an instinctive dislike for the man who has her heart. It’s a line that flatters friendship while quietly indicting romance. The joke has teeth because it reverses the usual hierarchy. In the sentimental script, love is the great validator and friends are supporting characters. Colette flips it: friends become the sharp-eyed jury, love the defendant whose charm doesn’t fool anyone in the room except the person most at risk.
“Spontaneous aversion” is the tell. She’s not talking about reasoned critique or a careful intervention; she’s talking about that immediate bodily recoil, the social equivalent of an immune response. The subtext is less “my friends are petty” than “my friends know my patterns.” Friends, in Colette’s world, read the private cost of her desire faster than she can narrate it into something noble. Their aversion becomes devotion because it’s protective, even when it’s impolite.
Context matters: Colette wrote out of a life thick with scandal, reinvention, and men (and women) who doubled as muses, collaborators, gatekeepers, and disasters. Having been both dazzled and used, she understands how love can recruit your taste against your own well-being. The line is cynical, yes, but it’s also intimate: real friends don’t merely witness your romance; they feel the draft from the trapdoor before you step on it.
“Spontaneous aversion” is the tell. She’s not talking about reasoned critique or a careful intervention; she’s talking about that immediate bodily recoil, the social equivalent of an immune response. The subtext is less “my friends are petty” than “my friends know my patterns.” Friends, in Colette’s world, read the private cost of her desire faster than she can narrate it into something noble. Their aversion becomes devotion because it’s protective, even when it’s impolite.
Context matters: Colette wrote out of a life thick with scandal, reinvention, and men (and women) who doubled as muses, collaborators, gatekeepers, and disasters. Having been both dazzled and used, she understands how love can recruit your taste against your own well-being. The line is cynical, yes, but it’s also intimate: real friends don’t merely witness your romance; they feel the draft from the trapdoor before you step on it.
Quote Details
| Topic | Friendship |
|---|---|
| Source | Help us find the source |
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