"Proust not only brought to the fore the beauty of centuries past but also set the scene for the era of modernism. This genius could not have so gloriously entered the twentieth century had he not proudly stood on the shoulders of giants." --From the Conclusion

Reading was so important to Marcel Proust that it sometimes seems he was unable to create a character without a book in hand. Everybody in his work reads: servants and masters, children and parents, artists and physicians. The more sophisticated among them find it natural to speak in quotations. Proust made literary taste a means of defining personality and gave literature an actual role to play in his fiction.

In this wonderfully entertaining book, scholar and biographer Anka Muhlstein draws out these themes in Proust's work and life, thus providing not only a friendly introduction to the momentous In Search of Lost Time, but also allowing glimpses at some of the highlights and lost treasures of French literature.