It is fantastically easy to imitate Proust's distinctive writing style, the way he wrote, his words arranged together, like soldiers standing in a line, a line such as that which divides the present from the past like a glass barrier, a barrier through which we may perceive that foreign land, but no more alter it than a moth might alter the moon, the dispassionate moon, sailing through the sky, casting its gaze on all of creation, observing, distant, casting a cold light on the face of the sleeping world, a world oblivious to the interloper wandering about it, wandering through the night sky like a moth, a moth perceiving the past through a glass barrier, a barrier of glass, square, maybe five feet across, dimpled, with wires running in criss-cross patterns through its milky depths like fish through a sea of confusion, and so forth.

The closest modern equivalent to Proust is probably Peter Greenaway, whose films are lengthy, hyper-detailed, and often tinged with surrealism. Or Nicholson Baker, who writes chapter-long footnotes. And with his critiques of the banalities of the ruling elite Brett Easton Ellis has undoubtedly drawn inblood from Proust's pen.

Not to be confused with the other famous Marcel, Marcel Marceau.