French author Proust engineered good reviews, letters show
(WorldNews Entertainment)

PARIS: Letters showing how Marcel Proust waged a charm offensive to win France´s top literary prize -- and ensure his books got glowing reviews -- will go under the hammer next month. Like many an ambitious and well-connected writer after him, the cache lays bare how the author of `Remembrance of Things Past` pulled every possible string to make sure his books were hailed as masterpieces. Proust roped in friends like Jean Cocteau and his young lover Lucien Daudet -- the son of the celebrated novelist Alphonse Daudet -- to make sure that his books got the praise he felt they deserved. Sixteen letters that Proust wrote to the influential newspaperman Rene Blum between 1913 and 1916 form...