In Search of Lost Time

The first of the seven volumes of Marcel Proust's novel introduces its main themes, including involuntary memory, as the narrator recalls childhood in Paris and Combray, most memorably his mother's good-night kiss. His love for Gilberte, daughter of Charles Swann, leads into the story of Swann's love for Odette, set against the rise of the Verdurins, a nouveau riche family. Of its four parts, Swann in Love is a self-contained third-person story, sometimes printed alone and seen as a good introduction. After several publishers rejected it, including the Nouvelle Revue Francaise on Andre Gide's advice, Proust paid to publish it himself. This English edition is D. J. Enright's revision of Terence Kilmartin's reworking of the C. K. Scott Moncrieff translation.

WalktheChat co-founder Thomas Graziani calls Proust's seven-volume work his favorite book, ranking its style among the most beautiful he has read and saying it makes readers look at daily life more deeply.