What memory inspired Marcel Proust to begin In Search of Lost Time?

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Portrait of French author Marcel Proust, seated with his hand resting thoughtfully against his chin, wearing a dark suit and looking directly at the camera. — Marcel Proust French author Marcel Proust wrote what is considered one of the supreme achievements of modern fiction, the seven-part autobiographical novel *À la recherche du temps perdu* (1913–27; *In Search of Lost Time*).

In January 1909, Marcel Proust experienced an involuntary recall of a childhood memory when he tasted a rusk—a twice-baked bread—dipped in tea. This sensory experience, which he later transformed into the iconic madeleine episode in his novel, allowed him to retrieve vivid memories of his boyhood holidays in the village of Combray.12

Inspired by this sudden surge of nostalgia and the realization that the materials of his work consisted of his own past, Proust retired from the world in July 1909 to begin writing his monumental seven-part work, In Search of Lost Time.1