Honoré de Balzac

Lost Illusions, by Honore de Balzac, is part of the Barnes & Noble Classics series, which offers quality editions at affordable prices to the student and the general reader, including new scholarship, thoughtful design, and pages of carefully crafted extras. Here are some of the remarkable features of Barnes & Noble Classics: • New introductions commissioned from todays top writers and scholars • Biographies of the authors • Chronologies...

Honoré de Balzac (1799-1850) produced a huge collection of novels, novellas and short stories, earning him recognition as a great master of the novel, as well as one of the creators of literary realism. He collected and arranged his works under the name "La Comédie humaine", which he then divided into eight major topics. "Eugénie Grandet" was placed in the section titled, "Scenes from Provincial Life". The story takes place in the French town of...

Eugénie Grandet (1833) is a novel by French author Honoré de Balzac. Written as Balzac began to formulate the grand scale of his La Comédie humaine sequence, Eugénie Grandet was eventually tied into the universe of his epic realist masterpiece, a holistic vision of nineteenth-century French society which sought to observe the consequences of the political, religious, and economic shifts of the Revolution and in its aftermath. This novel looks...

Father Goriot (1835) is a novel by French author Honoré de Balzac. An early work in his La Comédie humaine sequence, Father Goriot has since become one of Balzac's most critically and commercially successful novels. It contains several characters who appear throughout his other books and is considered to be the first novel in which he perfected his hallmark realist style. The novel, set in Paris, follows Eugène de Rastignac, a young law student...

One of the fathers of Realism was the famed 19th century French writer Honore de Balzac. His works are best known for their shrewd, yet honest, interpretation of real life problems within the social classes of French society. He believed that explaining a character would not inform the reader about the character's personality; however, describing their home, possessions, and other details would tell the reader about the character's true nature. With...

In The Duchesse of Langeais, Honore De Balzac tells us the story of an ill-fated love affair between a Parisian socialite and a Napoleonic war hero. The depth of character is, astonishing and the writing superb.

From the great French novelist comes this long-unavailable collection of tales in the tradition of Boccaccio's Decameron.Balzac's Contes Drolatiques, or Droll Stories, were originally published in three volumes in the 1830s. Set in medieval Europe, these stories were Balzac's attempt to write in the great tradition of Rabelais and Boccaccio, to render the Middle Ages with a touch of raunchy humor, and to provide a delightful portrait of medieval France....

Beginning with a visceral description of the society and politics of Paris, The Girl with the Golden Eyes considers the sex life of the upper class by its raw depiction of the underside of Parisian life. Henri de Marsay is a young, rich man who is nearly devoid of morals and virtue. After he meets Paquita Valdes, a mysterious and beautiful woman, he becomes infested with a deviant lust for her. When his plan to seduce her succeeds, Henri and Paquita...

The Chouans) is an 1829 novel by French novelist and playwright Honoré de Balzac (1799–1850) and included in the Scènes de la vie militaire section of his novel sequence La Comédie humaine. Set in the French region of Brittany, the novel combines military history with a love story between the aristocratic Marie de Verneuil and the Chouan royalist Alphonse de Montauran. It takes place during the 1799 post-war uprising in Fougères.

La Fille aux yeux d'or est une nouvelle d'Honoré de Balzac parue en 1835, troisième volet de l'Histoire des Treize qui regroupe Ferragus, La Duchesse de Langeais et La Fille aux yeux d'or. L'ensemble fait partie des Scènes de la vie parisienne, Études de mœurs, de La Comédie humaine. En 1841, Balzac dédicace le roman à Eugène Delacroix. Alors qu'il se promène aux Tuileries, Marsay rencontre son ami Paul de Manerville à qui il explique...