Valentin Louis Georges Eugène Marcel Proust (French pronounced: maʁsɛl pʁust) (10 July 1871 – 18 November 1922) was a French novelist, essayist and critic, best known as the author of "À la recherche du temps perdu" (in English, "Remembrance of Things Past)", a monumental work of twentieth-century fiction published in seven parts from 1913 to 1927.