Short Works

La Fille aux yeux d'or

La Fille aux yeux d'or (English: The Girl With the Golden Eyes) is a novella by Honoré de Balzac. It is the third part of the Thirteen series, which includes the short stories Ferragus and The Duchesse de Langeais. It is also part of his La Comédie humaine novel sequence.

The story follows the decadent heir Henri de Marsay, who becomes enamored of the titular beauty, Paquita Valdes, and plots to seduce her. Though he succeeds, he becomes disillusioned when he discovers she is also involved with another lover, and plots to murder her. When he arrives to kill her, he discovers she's already dead by the hand of her lover - his half-sister. She declares that Paquita came from a land where women are no more than chattels, able to be bought and used in any way. In the last lines of the story, de Marsay idly tells a friend that the girl has died of consumption.

Honorine (novel)

Honorine is an 1843 novel by French novelist and playwright Honoré de Balzac (1799-1850) and included in his series of novels (or Roman-fleuve) known as La Comédie humaine (The Human Comedy) which parodies and depicts French society in the period of the Restoration and the July Monarchy (1815-1848). Balzac has a subtle way of approaching his plot indirectly and embedding a story within a story. The story is perhaps a common one of a wife trapped in a marriage, but is approached in an interesting manner.

Maurice is a Consul at Genes, a Mediterranean town where he has married Onorina the daughter of the only wealthy man into the town, although it seems he was originally extremely reluctant to get married. They are having a dinner party with guests from Paris, and Maurice recounts some of his history.

When Maurice was young, he became secretary to Count Octave. The count was very good to him but seemed very sad and mysterious as if hiding some past misfortune. Eventually Maurice discovers that he had been married, but his wife had left him. She, Honorine, had been brought up with him from a very early age, having been adopted by his parents, and they were devoted to each other. They had become married almost as a matter of course. However after a few months she just disappeared. Octave then discovered she had gone off with an adventurer who had abandoned her, pregnant. She had the child but lived full of remorse, and resisted all attempts of Octave to get in touch with her. Octave is still devoted to her and secretly helps her in her business of flower arranging. However she still refuses to have anything to do with him. The Count therefore gets Maurice to act as a go between, arranging for him to occupy the house next to her, and pose as a misogynistic flower breeder. Eventually Maurice makes contact and indirectly puts the Count’s case. Honorine is still to overcome with remorse and shame. Eventually however she agrees to see the count, and then goes back to live with him.

Maurice has to leave the Count’s company because of the part he played and that is why he became consul. Two years after, he heard of the death of Honorine, and soon after was visited by the Count who had grown old before his time, and who died shortly after departing. The story is full of discussion about the meaning of relationships and Maurice acts throughout as interpreter for the two parties. There is also the implication that he had in fact fallen in love with Honorine himself, which is why he avoided marriage initially.

Louis Lambert (novel)

Louis Lambert is an 1832 novel by French novelist and playwright Honoré de Balzac (1799–1850), included in the Études philosophiques section of his novel sequence La Comédie humaine. Set mostly in a school at Vendôme, it examines the life and theories of a boy genius fascinated by the Swedish philosopher Emanuel Swedenborg (1688–1772).

Balzac wrote Louis Lambert during the summer of 1832 while he was staying with friends at the Château de Saché, and published three editions with three different titles. The novel contains a minimal plot, focusing mostly on the metaphysical ideas of its boy-genius protagonist and his only friend (eventually revealed to be Balzac himself). Although it is not a significant example of the realist style for which Balzac became famous, the novel provides insight into the author's own childhood. Specific details and events from the author's life – including punishment from teachers and social ostracism – suggest a fictionalized autobiography.

While he was a student at Vendôme, Balzac wrote an essay called Traité de la Volonté ("Treatise on the Will"); it is described in the novel as being written by Louis Lambert. The essay discusses the philosophy of Swedenborg and others, although Balzac did not explore many of the metaphysical concepts until much later in his life. Ideas analyzed in the essay and elsewhere in the novel include the split between inward and outward existence; the presence of angels and spiritual enlightenment; and the interplay between genius and madness.

Although critics panned the novel, Balzac remained steadfast in his belief that it provided an important look at philosophy, especially metaphysics. As he developed the scheme for La Comédie humaine, he placed Louis Lambert in the Études philosophiques section, and later returned to the same themes in his novel Séraphîta, about an androgynous angelic creature.

Le Contrat de mariage

Le Contrat de mariage (English: A Marriage Contract or A Marriage Settlement) is an 1835 novel by French author Honoré de Balzac (1799-1850) and included in the Scènes de la vie privée section of his novel sequence La Comédie humaine. Set in Bordeaux, it describes the marriage of a Parisian gentleman, Paul de Manerville, to the beautiful but spoiled Spanish heiress, Natalie Evangelista.

Paul de Manerville is a gentleman born of wealth and nobility who decides, over the objections of his worldly friend de Marsay, to give up his elegant bachelor’s life and get married at the age of twenty-seven. He falls in love with a beautiful girl named Natalie Evangelista, the daughter of a proud Spanish matriarch whose financial assets have been diminishing since the death of her husband. Too naïve and full of illusions to see the hidden motives of Natalie Evangelista’s mother, who wants Paul’s wealth in order to procure for her daughter the lavish lifestyle she believes to be her birthright, or to recognize that his bride’s loyalty is entirely with her mother and not with him, Paul gets himself stuck in a frigid and childless marriage. So strong are his illusions, that even at the end of the novel he remains unaware of his wife’s infidelities.

A Marriage Contract is one of Balzac’s great studies of human illusions, in this case the illusions of married life. Paul is a subtly conveyed example of the husband, “the voluntary dupe” who prefers “to suffer rather than complain.” The novel is notable for treating not only the courtship leading up to the marriage, but the negotiations which follow. A Marriage Contract also has one of Balzac’s classic dissections of the techniques and wiles of professional negotiators.

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