This year marks the centenary of the death of Marcel Proust, whose monumental "In Search of Lost Time" continues to both inspire and frustrate. The novel's major themes—the nature of art and philosophy, of love and loss, and of time and memory—are set forth in a meandering flow of over a million words. But too sharp a focus on those themes can lead us to overlook matters of historical fact, some of which have continuing analogical import. I'm thinking in particular of the Dreyfus Affair, a complex scandal briming with secrecy and intrigue, nationalism and prejudice.