Title: In Search of Lost Time, Volume 1: Swann’s Way
Author: Marcel Proust
Published: 1913
Pages: 379
Structure: 3 parts
Swann’s Way is the most challenging book that I have read, and the most descriptive. It is, however, merely the first of seven volumes in a work recognised by Guinness World Records as the world’s longest novel. There is very little plot, sections of it are incredibly dense, with complex sentences that continue for more than a page, and it took me two attempts in six months to finish just the first volume. So why read it?