ABSTRACT
For Proust, the importance of sharpening our vision to the essence of existence is what lends the novel its distinctive value; narrative art permits the retroactive clarification of the chaos of impressions. Although he ultimately placed a higher value on these sensory and emotional impressions, Proust recognized the necessity of the intellect's power to bring together into a coherent whole such disparate elements. The precious quality and rarity of these impressions call for the more solid structure of the art form. For Proust, the writer's true vocation is the individual act of creation rather than the mere art of observation. Equally important is that the reader of fiction become a more sophisticated reader of his or her own self: the true worth of fiction is the reader's self-recognition in the author's words.
