The extraordinary life and times of Marcel Proust, one of the greatest literary voices of the twentieth century, by "Proust's definitive biographer" (Harold Bloom) Selected by New York Times Book Review as a Best Book Since 2000 Based on a wealth of letters, memoirs, workbooks, and manuscripts unavailable before, the book examines Proust's character and development as an artist, the glittering Parisian world of which he was a part, and the passions that enabled him to write his masterpiece, In Search of Lost Time. "Serious, thoughtful, well-balanced, well-informed. . . . Carter is the kind of reader Proust hoped for, one who understands that a great work compels us to become better readers of ourselves."-Victor Brombert, Los Angeles Times "An impeccably researched and well-paced narrative that brings vividly and credibly to life not only the writer himself but also the changing world he knew."-Roger Pearson, New York Times Book Review