In Balzac's vast Human Comedy, a body of ninety-one completed novels and stories, he endeavoured to create a complete picture of contemporary French society and manners. Within this work is a loving ode to Paris and an incomparable introduction to the first capital of the modern world.
To this ageless city he makes a declaration of love in an accumulation of finely observed detail - the caf?s, landmarks, avenues, parks - and captures the populace in countless meticulously drawn portraits: its lawyers, grisettes, journalists, concierges, usurers, salesmen, speculators.
Balzac gathered the elements of this Paris by sauntering through it. 'To saunter is a science,' he writes, 'it is the gastronomy of the eye. To take a walk is to vegetate; to saunter is to live.' Eric Hazan follows in Balzac's footsteps, criss-crossing the city in the novelist's outsize boots, running between printers, publishers, coffee merchants, mistresses and friends, stopping for a moment, struck by a detail that would be fixed in Balzac's photographic memory.
More than a tour of the city, Balzac's Paris is an attempt to measure the soul of a city as recovered in its finest literature.
- 208 pages
- English
- ePUB (mobile friendly)
- Available on iOS & Android
eBook - ePub
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Information
Topic
Personal DevelopmentSubtopic
Historical Literary CriticismTable of contents
- Cover
- Halftitle
- Titlepage
- Copyright
- Contents
- Translations and Acknowledgements
- Why Paris?
- A Wanderer
- The Street
- Quarters
- The Press
- Publishers
- At the Theatre
- Friends, Politics, and the ‘Realism’ of Balzac’s Paris
- Notes
- Index of Names
- Index of Works
- Index of Publications
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Yes, you can access Balzac's Paris by Eric Hazan in PDF and/or ePUB format, as well as other popular books in Personal Development & Historical Literary Criticism. We have over 1.5 million books available in our catalogue for you to explore.