Alain de Botton

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De Botton’s short, highly stylized books are a treat. The novels, beginning with Essays on Love, chart the emotions through the various stages of relationships with an intelligence, wit and lightness of touch that are rarely to be met in English fiction. Naïve pictures and diagrams are used semi-ironically, and the playful tone is consistently engaging. They are deliberately limited, and all the better for it – like pieces of chamber music which do not pretend to be symphonies. 

How Proust Can Change Your Life was a bestseller, and deservedly so. While its archness would certainly put off some readers, it is a gem of literary dalliance and offers real insights into Proust. As with the novels, the playful tone is deliciously refreshing.

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