"For a long time I used to go to bed early": possibly the most famous opening line in the French language and the first words of a masterly work whose author himself would even compare to a cathedral. In Search of Lost Time, the work of a man: Marcel Proust, the man of the work. Never before had a writer taken introspection and the workings of memory to such a level, and in the course of this prodigious quest brought a quasi-mystical aura to the taste of the humble Madeleine for generations of readers around the world. A work of keys, famously obscure -- that famous Proustian phrase -- and yet overflowing with fantasies, "In Search of Lost Time" gives us an invitation to penetrate the mysteries and secrets of its author. He is often described as a nervous, painfully shy individual, hiding away in his cork-lined bedroom; but between his fantasies and his real life experiences, who was the real Marcel Proust? And what can we learn from the famous Questionnaire to which he replied and which now carries his name? Containing many photographs, manuscripts and other unique documents, some of them never before published, this book -- the first of its kind about this literary genius -- celebrates the life and an era that have become timeless through the magic of the author's unique style.