Le Temps returné: Temporal Distortion in À la recherche du temps perdu and Twin Peaks: The Return

Abstract

various social to unravel the intricate symbols around that hint at the greater vocation he is meant to accomplish. In broad strokes, this is the plot of both Marcel Proust’s 1913 1927 novel À la recherche du temps perdu and David Lynch and Mark Frost’s 2017 streaming series Twin Peaks: The Return. At their core, both works are parables about time. This is clear from their titles alone, which echo one another by evoking backward-facing temporal positions, but also by evoking the idea of a quest, a search, and a return. I read the Recherche and The Return together as two works of art uniquely driven not just to consider time but to create and manip-ulate it, using medial and narrative strategies to halt, distort, and otherwise render time visible.