PROUST, MARCEL

PROUST, MARCEL (1871–1922), French novelist. Proust was born in Paris to Adrien Proust, a successful non-Jewish physician, and Jeanne (née Weil), a member of an old Alsatian-Jewish family. Through his mother, Proust was related to the eminent statesman Adolphe Crémieux and to the wife of henri bergson , whose theories of time and memory were   a possible influence on him. By 1893 it became obvious that Proust's delicate health would not allow him to follow any profession, and he thereafter devoted himself to writing and to the pursuit of social advancement. His wealth and personal qualities gave him an entrée into the high society that was to form the background to his literary works. He became a contributor to literary reviews, helped to found the short-lived Le Banquet (1892) and in 1896 published two books – Portraits de peintres, a volume of poems, and Les Plaisirs et les jours, a collection of poems, stories, and sketches. Proust's outstanding work, A la Recherche du temps perdu (15 vols., 1913–27), one of the masterpieces of 20th century literature in its representation of the nature and texture of memory and its evocation of fin de siècle French society, consists of seven parts: Du côté de chez Swann (1913); A l'Ombre des jeunes filles en fleurs (1918); Le Côté de Guermantes (1920); Sodome et Gomorrhe (1921); La Prisonnière (1923); Albertine disparue (1925); and Le Temps retrouvé (1927). Though not strictly autobiographical, the novel cycle contains much material based on personal recollections and encounters. During the last 17 years of his life he was an invalid, and spent most of his time locked up in his Paris apartment, feverishly working on his manuscripts and revising his published work. Raised as a Catholic, Proust alludes to his Jewish ancestry in his writings, describing his mother and maternal grandparents, and mentioning his grandfather's practice of placing a pebble on his parents' grave. In Du côté de chez Swann, his grandfather admits a preference for his Jewish friends and Proust himself remained on the closest terms with Jews such as Léon Brunschvicg , and the convert Daniel Halévy . He always retained some Jewish sympathies, and it was he who persuaded Anatole France to intervene in the dreyfus Affair. A la recherche du temps perdu contains three major Jewish characters: the actress rachel ; the aggressive unsympathetic intellectual Albert Bloch; and the assimilated Charles Swann, a member of the exclusive Jockey Club, who has been seen as Proust's own alter ego. The snobbishness of Proust's Jewish characters masks their basic insecurity and, like his creator, Swann finally discovers his identity when he sides with Dreyfus and detaches himself from high society. The contrasting titles of Du Côté de chez Swann ("the Side of Swann") and Le Côté de Guermantes ("the Side of Guermantes") reflect the conflicting Jewish and non-Jewish sides of Proust's own heritage. Other works published after his death include the fragmentary novel, Jean Santeuil (3 vols., 1952), and the critical study Contre Sainte-Beuve (1954). C.K. Scott Moncrief produced the first English translation of A la recherch du temps perdu in the 1920s under the title Remembrance of Things Past, reworked by Terence Kilmartin and subsequently revised by D.J Enright as In Search of Lost Time. Pléiade published its second, definitive French edition in 1987–89. Correspondance de Marcel Proust appeared in 1970–93 in 21 volumes (ed. Philip Kolb). -BIBLIOGRAPHY: A. Spire, Quelques juifs et demi-juifs (1928), 45–61; Quenell, in: H. Bolitho (ed.), Twelve Jews (1934), 177–99; L. Pierre-Quint, Marcel Proust, sa vie, son oeuvre (1936); Moss, The Magic Lantern of Marcel Proust, (1980); Van Praag, in: Revue juive de Genève, 5 (May-July, 1937); A. Maurois, The Quest for Proust (1950); Mesnil, in: E.J. Finbert (ed.), Aspects du Génie d'Israël (1950), 297–300; G. Cattavi, Marcel Proust (Fr., 1958); C. Lehrmann, L'Elément juif dans la littérature française, 2 (1961), 134–41; G.D. Painter, Marcel Proust, a Biography, 2 vols. (1965); C. Mauriac, Proust par lui-même (1953); de Silva Ramos, in: Les cahiers Marcel Proust, 6 (1932), 13–86 (incl. bibl.). ADD. BIBLIOGRAPHY: H. Bloom (ed.), Remembrance of Things Past (critical essays; 1992); J.-Y. Tadie, Marcel Proust: A Life (2000); W.C. Carter, Marcel Proust: A Life (2000). (Georges Cattaui)