 At the time of this publication, Proust was already translating Ruskin's "Sesame and Lilies", which he completed in June 1905, just before his mother's death, and published in 1906.Literary historians and critics have ascertained that, apart from Ruskin, Proust's chief literary influences included Saint-Simon, Montaigne, Stendhal, Flaubert, George Eliot, Fyodor Dostoyevsky, and Leo Tolstoy.1908 was an important year for Proust's development as a writer.