My only consolation when I am really sad is to love and to be loved.

With his monumental seven-volume novel “In Search of Lost Time,” published between 1913 and 1927, Marcel Proust became one of the most influential authors of the 20th century, shaping the trajectory of modern literature. His writing, with themes of memory, love, and the nature of art itself, has acquired a reputation for verbosity. His most famous novel, after all, is more than 4,200 pages long, and one section alone, “The Guermantes Way,” is infamous for dedicating 120 pages to describing a single dinner party. But reading Proust is well worth the effort, both for his dazzling prose and for his insightful way of finding and revealing life’s simple, shining truths.