Though I am not really writing about Proust in my paper, in my research I could not help but make connections between In Search of Lost Time and research texts, including one of my YA lit primary sources, John Green’s Looking for Alaska. I have a theory that LFA is a simplified, contemporary retelling of the story of Marcel and Albertine. Here are my reasons, some more superficial than others:

• Green’s characters are named Miles and Alaska. In my experience, the retention of first letters is a common practice when changing characters’ names for a retelling.
• The overall story arc and some characterization: Miles is obsessed with Alaska from first sight, though she is not particularly interested in him except as a friend. Alaska is incredibly charming to all around her. Miles’s obsession grows and grows over a relatively short time: September to February of a single school year. Then, Alaska dies ambiguously—maybe an accident, maybe suicide. Miles’s obsession grows exponentially as he tries to solve the mystery of her death, and the mysteries of her life that eluded him when she was still around. Sound familiar?
• Miles’s flattening of Alaska from a complex and subjective individual into a two-dimensional image of Woman and Romance (a topic of my essay) parallels Marcel’s treatment of Albertine.
• The story takes place over a limited time, at a remove from parents, though instead of being summer at a resort it is a school year at a boarding school in Alabama.
• Alaska is not orphaned, but she did lose her mother very young. Meanwhile, Miles has a very secure and stable family that he is merely temporarily separated from. Familiar again.
• The book’s attempt to put pressure on the concept of romantic obsession and romantic (rather than sexual) objectification, though it is not very successful (another topic of my essay), is similar to some of the larger themes permeating not just the Albertine storyline, but also ISOLT as a whole.

Of course, it is also possible that the trope of romantic obsession is simply old and common enough that Green need not have intentionally or even unintentionally retold Marcel and Albertine’s story for these commonalities to emerge. Certainly at least Alaska falls into the category of the “Manic Pixie Dream Girl” character, a trope that is very common in contemporary media and may have earlier roots. Albertine is arguably too well-developed as a character to be categorized as an MPDG, but Marcel’s perspective on her is definitely related to that trope. So perhaps these commonalities are not specific enough to make a case for LFA as a retelling. Maybe I will try to ask the author since he has a fairly responsive online presence. It’s worth a try. I will update if anything comes of it!