Swann’s Way is the first of seven volumes of In Search of Lost Time (previously translated as Remembrance of Things Past), the magnum opus by Marcel Proust. The central theme is the nature of involuntary memory and how associations color and shape feelings in a constantly unfolding manner. The story is told by a young Narrator, never named, who recounts his visits to the family’s country home in the fictional village of Combray and centers on his fascination with Charles Swann, an elegant and well-connected friend of his parents with a beautiful daughter and a difficult marriage. There is a famous moment when the taste of a madeleine cake dipped in tea evokes a powerful nostalgia and uncorks a stream of memories of forgotten persons, events and connections that evolve and intertwine over a long arc of time. Swann’s Way is divided into four parts: Combray I, sometimes thought of as the “Overture” and which ends with the episode of the madeleine; Combray II; Un Amour de Swann, a self-contained novella of Swann’s affair with Odette de Crecy; and Nom de pays: le nom (Names of places: the name). The volume was rejected by numerous publishers and published in 1913 at Proust’s expense. Readers and critics were initially confounded by the introspective characters, lack of much action or plot, and by the mass of memories and contemplation, but soon realized the brilliance of the work and the consummate skill of the writer. It is considered one of the five most important literary achievements of the twentieth century.

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