He became known as a poet and novelist in the 1930s and achieved the first major critical success with The Black Book, written in Paris in 1938. However, it is The Quartet of Alexandria, the impressive tetralogy composed by Justine (1957), Balthazar (1958), Mountolive (1958) and Clea (1960), the work that makes it a classic of our time – largely due to his exploration of the possibilities of narrative language – and which provoked enthusiastic comparisons of the author with Proust and Faulkner.

The Dark Maze (1958), Tunc (1968), or Nunquam (1970) are other good examples of his talent. With Monsieur or The Prince of Darkness (1974) he initiated a quintet or, in his words, a quincunce (completed with Livia, Constance, Sebastian and Quinx) who took his narrative research a step forward and established his work of maturity. He is also the author of poetry (Full Poems, 1931-1974, 1980) and several works halfway between the essay and the travel book.