Reddit reviews In Search of Lost Time: Proust 6-pack (Modern Library Classics)

Sounds like In Search of Lost Time by Marcel Proust.

Personally, I always preferred the older translation of the title: Remembrance of Things Past.

Also the basis for a very funny Monty Python sketch

In Search of Lost Time by Marcel Proust

Total page count: 4,211

I think it's this one https://www.amazon.com/Search-Lost-Time-Proust-Complete/dp/0812969642/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1474384486&sr=1-1&keywords=in+search+of+lost+time+box+set

Proust didn't really write anything else. I think it's best to just jump in the first time and plow through it without backtracking too much -- it's really meant to be reread. If you want some context, it may help to read up on Proust. Carter's biography is pretty good. Also, the Modern Library edition has an incredible index which is super useful for tracing themes/recurring ideas or objects. A reference guide would be useful, but one that covers all the art should be good enough for a first time through (one of the things that interested me most about Recherche was its attention to other art media).

I read the Modern Library one, which was very good in my mind. Here's the amazon.ca link, although I'm sure they have it in the US store if that's where you're located http://www.amazon.ca/Search-Lost-Time-Proust-6-pack/dp/0812969642/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1374503744&sr=1-1&keywords=in+search+of+lost+time

Thanks! If I could inspire just one person to give it a shot, I'd be delighted.

Here's the Gutenberg link to the first book, Swann's Way. Here's the whole kit & kaboodle on Amazon.

I suggest thinking of it as an ongoing, long-term commitment. If you need something lighter and more entertaining to cleanse your palette, you can always put it down and read something else. Proust'll be there waiting when you're ready.

I'd recommend this version. I got it as my graduation present when I graduated from college and finally had the time to do my own reading:

http://www.amazon.com/In-Search-Lost-Time-Complete/dp/0812969642

It's important to read the whole thing with the same translator. Also, most book stores will have the first volume or two, but not the last five or six. I can not stress this enough... this book is so much richer if you read the whole thing, even the sort of slow volumes in the middle. Proust had a masterful, overarching structure that assumes a greater thematic resonance once you've made it to the end.

I recommend Proust.

https://www.amazon.com/Search-Lost-Time-Library-Classics/dp/0812969642/

Looks like you're into sprawling epics, so you've got to add Marcel Proust's 6-volume In Search of Lost Time