Marcel Proust

Valentin Louis Georges Eugène Marcel Proust was a French novelist, literary critic, and essayist. He was born on July 10, 1871, in Paris. His father, Adrien Proust, was a doctor, and his mother, Jeanne Clémence Weil, came from a wealthy family. Proust grew up with a bad case of asthma, which made school hard for him.

Proust loved reading and writing. He spent time in fancy Paris salons with rich and famous people, which inspired his stories. His early book, Les plaisirs et les jours, didn’t get much notice when it came out in the 1890s.

In 1908, Proust started his most famous book, À la recherche du temps perdu, or In Search of Lost Time in English. This seven-part book came out between 1913 and 1927. It talks about memory, art, love, and life, using a style called stream of consciousness. It became very important in Modernist literature.

Proust kept working on his book even when he was very sick. He died from lung problems on November 18, 1922, at age 51. He was buried in Père Lachaise Cemetery in Paris.

Biography

Proust was born on 10 July 1871 in Paris, in a neighborhood called Auteuil. His family was wealthy. His father, Adrien Proust, was a doctor who studied diseases like cholera. His mother, Jeanne Clémence, came from a German-Jewish family in Alsace. Proust grew up in Paris during a time of big changes in France.

Proust had asthma as a child, which made him often feel unwell. He spent time in the village of Illiers, which later inspired a town in his famous book, In Search of Lost Time. He studied well and learned about literature. He also met many important people at social gatherings.

Proust worked a little in a library but mostly stayed in his apartment, writing. His mother passed away in 1905. In the last years of his life, he stayed in his room, writing his novel at night. He passed away in 1922.

Early writing

Proust loved to write from a young age. He wrote for school magazines and had his own society column in a journal called Le Mensuel. In 1892, he helped start another literary magazine named Le Banquet.

In 1896, Proust published a book called Les plaisirs et les jours. The book didn’t sell many copies because it cost too much. That same year, he started working on a novel named Jean Santeuil, which was finished after his death in 1952. This book showed up many ideas that later appeared in his famous work, In Search of Lost Time.

Proust also spent time reading writers like Thomas Carlyle, Ralph Waldo Emerson, and John Ruskin. He translated some of Ruskin’s books into French, working with others to help with the translations. His translation of The Bible of Amiens came out in 1904 and got good reviews.

In 1908, Proust wrote pieces that copied the styles of other writers, which helped him find his own voice. He also began working on essays and a new novel. By 1910, he was writing what would become his masterpiece, À la recherche du temps perdu.

In Search of Lost Time

Main article: In Search of Lost Time

A la recherche du temps perdu began in 1909 when Proust was 38 years old. It is a large book with seven parts. All together, these parts have about 3,200 pages, or around 4,300 pages in one special English version. Some famous writers, like Graham Greene, think Proust was one of the best writers of the twentieth century.

The first part of the book was turned down by a publisher. Another writer, André Gide, didn’t think it was good at first, but later said sorry to Proust. Proust used his own money to print the book and even paid some critics to say nice things about it. Proust passed away before he could finish changing the last few parts. His brother, Robert, helped finish them after he was gone. The book was changed into English by C. K. Scott Moncrieff and was called Remembrance of Things Past from 1922 to 1931. Later, the book’s name was made closer to the original, In Search of Lost Time.