Honoré de Balzac

Honoré de Balzac [ ɔnɔ'ʁe də balzak ] ( born May 20, 1799 in Tours, † August 18, 1850 in Paris) was a French writer. In the literature stories he is, although he belongs to the generation of the Romantics, as seen with a 17 -year-older Stendhal and Flaubert 22 years younger than triumvirate of great realist. His main work is around 88 titles are comprehensive, yet unfinished novel cycle La comédie humaine (English: The Human Comedy ), try to draw an overall picture of society in France of his time whose novels and short stories.

• 4.1 plays
• 4.2 juvenilia
• La Comédie humaine 4.3
• 4.4 Other works outside the Comédie humaine

Life

Childhood and youth

Honoré Balzac (his birth name) was because a 1798 -born brother died in infancy, the eldest child of Bernard- François Balzac ( 1746-1829 ), a farmer's son from the south-west France Tarn, and of Anne -Charlotte -Laure Sallambier (1778 -1854 ), a Parisian family of home cooking. The father, who had it brought before the revolution of Notary employees appointed secretary of a high official, had become after 1789 Secretary of Navy Minister and senior officials in the administration of the revolutionary army. As early as 1780, he had his actual name Balssa Frenchified to Balzac that he liked from 1803 at the latest decorated with a de. It was not until 1797 he had married at 50. His wife, a pretty and obviously educated person, was 19 when she married she gave the newborn Honoré and followed by his 1800 and 1802 -born nurses to nurses in nursing. 1807, a few months before she brought a apparently out of wedlock received son, she sent her just eight years of elders in a boarding Oratorian in Vendôme. From there he moved to 13, remained seated and ailing, in a Parisian school board and attended, again with little success, the Lycée Charlemagne. Overall, Balzac lived in retrospect his childhood and youth as joyless and developed a deep-seated grudge against his mother.

1814 was the father who had last been chief administrator of the hospital in Tours, a good post in Paris, and the family moved to the capital. Here Balzac in 1816 ended his time at school and took a law degree at the Graduate School of Law ( École de Droit ). However, he also attended lectures at the Paris philosophical- philological faculty ( Faculté des lettres ) and at the Collège de France and began to bring alongside philosophical thoughts on paper. From 1817 he also worked on an hourly basis as writing and legal assistant, first with a lawyer ( where he had the later comedy writer Eugène Scribe as colleagues ) and then at a friend of the family notary.

The beginnings as a writer and first debt

Beginning of 1819, he put the " baccalauréat en droit " from the admission test for the last stage of study before the " license", the actual conclusion. However, after the end of lectures in the summer, he broke off his studies because he had decided to become a writer. After the father had been willing him to finance two sample years, Balzac moved into a small attic apartment and began to write. The result was all kinds of Feuilletonistisches and Lyrical, fragments of an opera libretto and a tragedy.

In 1821 he met the already experienced author Auguste Lepoitevin know. Together with him and under his pseudonym " Viellerglé " he produced in the following years several novels, but tried it also distinguishes itself with its own, which he recorded under the pseudonym " Lord R'Hoone " or " Horace de Saint- Aubin ."

In 1822 he made ​​the acquaintance of the 45- year-old Mme de Berny, who became his first love and meted him a " sentimental éducation ". She stopped him until shortly before her death in 1836 connected as a motherly friend.

1823 Balzac tried again as a playwright with the piece Le Nègre, which was not accepted. Another trip in a different genre, the epic poem Fœdora, was not finished. Alongside he wrote reviews for the feuilleton littéraire the young publicist Horace Raisson, with whom he also pursued other literary projects. After all, he deserved in the meantime with his pen so much that he was able, his parents 100 Franc fare money to pay monthly to keep a certain social life and to take trips to the country estates of aristocratic or upper-class host.

The expected breakthrough as an author, however, he still failed despite his hard-working continued novel production. The end of 1824 he therefore seems to be falling into a depression. Even later have his juvenilia not apply attained, although he often treated in topics such as the pursuit of recognition and money, and types designed, for example, the energetic young climbers who were later typical of him.

Beginning of 1825, he learned about his sister Laure in Versailles, the Duchesse d' Abrantès know who was taking a relationship with him and gave him insights into the world of contemporary nobility. In August, 23 died with his youngest sister, Laurence de Montzaigle, the 1821 contracted marriage was unhappy. In the fall of Balzac began This displays a slightly cynical and illusion -free marriage manual for even single men: Physiologie du mariage, which he, however, until 1829 completed it and published anonymously.

Also in 1825 Balzac tried as Compagnon a Parisian publisher and issued per an illustrated and annotated Molière and La Fontaine - output. Acquired taste as a publisher, he bought in 1826 with loans Mme de Bernys and especially his mother, a printing company, which he 1827 letters foundry angliederte. Already in 1828, however, he was forced to declare bankruptcy, assign the foundry in the Son of Mme de Bernys and close the print due to a skipped from England to France economic crisis. He remained lifelong debtor his mother, his father († 1829) and survived him. After all, he had received in his capacity as a publisher contact with several authors of the School of the Romantics, including Victor Hugo and Alfred de Vigny.

The time of success

In the following years, Balzac concentrated again to the letter. In 1829, he finally had success (later revised and renamed to Les Chouans, ou La Bretagne en 1799) Le dernier with Chouan, ou La Bretagne en 1800. It is a historical novel by the new style of Walter Scott, who portrays the tragic end of one of the last royalist resistance fighters against the revolutionary regime with a young nobleman as protagonists. Les Chouans was also the first work that Balzac drew with his name. This he continued rapidly advancing a "de", as it 's success began to open the Parisian salons.

In the next few years he led an extremely diverse and eventful existence. So he founded in 1830, the year of the July Revolution, with the later newspaper magnate Girardin a political magazine. 1831 and again in 1832 he was considering running for a parliamentary seat, then but it was limited to a role as a very active journalist, where he in 1835 majority shareholder of a political and literary magazine was, however, already in 1836 received. His political position advanced in these years clearly to the right, since 1832, the pseudo- aristocratic bourgeoisie had found a noble friend, the Marquise de Castries, connection to circuits of legitimists that the 1830 resigned Charles X continued to regard as the legitimate king and the new " citizen King " Louis -Philippe refused.

In addition, Balzac traveled a lot in order to be a guest in the summer residences of distinguished people or to follow one of the numerous, mostly married ladies with whom he aspired conditions or entertained. Here he was apparently also the father out of wedlock conceived children, and indeed in 1834 a Marie du Fresnay 1836 and a Lionel Richard Guido Boni Visconti.

1832 began the Polish Countess Ewelina Hanska a long correspondence with Balzac. In September 1833, came in the Swiss Neuchatel to a first encounter between Hanska and Balzac, in December another meeting in Geneva and again in 1835 in Vienna.

After the success of the Chouans passable paid and increasingly recognized, Balzac wrote numerous short stories and novels, the first sequel came out as a rule in magazines before they appeared in book form. Early on, he developed the habit of each several already printed works under group titles together again to market, so in 1830 the two-volume Scènes de la vie privée ( with ao La Maison du chat qui pelote and Gobseck ), 1831 Romans et contes philosophiques ( with ao La Peau de chagrin ), in 1832 a first volume of Contes Drolatiques and 1833, the two-volume Scènes de la vie de Province ( with ao Eugénie Grandet ).

In October 1833 Balzac entered into a publishing agreement, according to which he had from existing and yet to be written works to create a three by four equal twelve volume collection of "scenes" that should appear under the general title Études de mœurs au XIXe siècle. Still in 1833 he delivered two volumes Scènes de la vie de province, in 1834 he began the Scènes de la vie parisienne.

In the same year 1834, he had previously written and future narrative works to make while writing one of his best novels Le Père Goriot ( Father Goriot ), the idea of ​​the characters of his time and again occur to them and around them a to give rise to manageable world. Really, he created so over time a universe of over 2,000 figures, which should be representative of the post-revolutionary French society at the same time and give a vivid idea of life at least of contemporary bourgeois and aristocratic layers together with their domestics, in fact.

For the purposes of this idea chose Balzac, when he in 1841 with a Publisher group agreed on a complete edition of his existing and planned narrative oeuvre and this 1842 with three first volumes opened, the top title La Comédie humaine. Here, the individual novels and stories should not only be combined into larger groups ( Études philosophiques, Études analytiques and Études de mœurs ), but also to subgroups ( Scènes de la vie privée, etc.).

In order to achieve this project Balzac wrote obsessively in the coming years. His infernal rhythm of work (often 15 to 17 hours a day), he graduated symbolically as in a monk's cowl, and his enormous coffee consumption were legendary.

The extraordinary vitality and creativity of Balzac were not limited to his literary activity as narrator, journalist and occasional ( always unsuccessful ) playwright. Rather, he was a bon vivant who, despite his growing debt with a luxurious lifestyle coach, good clothes, elegant apartments and even to entertain a manor tried and used a complicated social life. He also had to about 1843 almost constantly mistress, where he was always able, willing self-sacrifice and often also to financial assistance prepare women for the best circles to bind to itself.

Founding of the Writers' Union

1838 was by him, Victor Hugo, Alexandre Dumas and George Sand Société de Gens de Lettres, the first French writers' association established, the Balzac contributed the major basic project, the code littéraire de la Société des Gens de Lettres, which for the first time the rights of writer postulated to their works. Because of disagreements he retired, however, from this union back soon. Balzac had very personal reasons to get involved here, since after the publication of his works in France, this was always reprinted in Belgium and much cheaper sold in large numbers throughout Europe, without that he got a share of it.

The last years

At the latest in 1843 and strengthened in 1844 he got health problems due to his constant over-exertion and his excessive coffee consumption. However, he tried to stun them with work or traveling to forget with Mme Hanska that his firm, but never permanently cohabiting partner was with him from 1845. With her he traveled in three summers, France, Germany, Italy and Switzerland, and with her on her Polish palace Wierzchownia at Berdychiv ( in what was then the Russian Empire ), he spent the winter of 1847 /48 and the year 1849. His hope there health care to let it was not fulfilled. On March 14, 1850 Balzac married his longtime partner Ewelina Hanska in Berdychiv. After several weeks and apparently grueling journey back to Paris Balzac died there on August 18, 1850. He was buried at the Paris Pere Lachaise Cemetery. The funeral speech was Victor Hugo.

Admission to the Académie française was Balzac despite several attempts ( last in the absence of 1849) not granted: His style, which, in fact, the rush is to be noted, in which he wrote, was in professional literary criticism the time to informally and thus untrustworthy. After all, Balzac in 1845 awarded the Legion of Honor.

In all likelihood, his widow moved into larger income from his writing than he had achieved in his lifetime itself. He used his namely, in principle, quite ordinary fees considerably thereby diminish that he on the proofs (ie, the sample print ) of his texts anbrachte so many improvements that the whole thing had to be re- set each.

Even during his lifetime Balzac was repeatedly portrayed by painters. Even cartoonists often took him to the grain. Today's most famous representation is probably the statue, which created Auguste Rodin 1893-1897 and which can be seen in the Rodin Museum in Paris.

Balzac's work

The Comédie Humaine ( The Human Comedy ) should be Balzac's life work, which he, however, could no longer accomplish. " Only " 91 of the planned 137 novels and short stories have been completed.

Balzac linked the individual texts to a cycle by leaving many figures occur more than once. With this literary innovation he wanted to create a system that was consistent with its intention to design a comprehensive (Sion ) paintings of his time: " The immensity of a plan which at the same time the history and criticism of society, the analysis of their evil and the discussion includes its principles entitles me, so it seems to me to give my work the title under which it appears today. > the human Comedy <" ( Balzac, preface to the human comedy )

Within this literary mirror image of contemporary relationships Balzac wrote Jewish figures anti-Jewish stereotypical characteristics to: Nucingen, one of the big bankers in Paris, is depicted as greedy. Besides, he has German roots, as well as Fritz Brunner from Le Cousin Pons, the Balzac " beaucoup de Juiverie " ( " a great deal of Jewish cunning / craftiness " ) attested.

Effect

Balzac's narrative is true in the history of literature as prototypical of the traditional novel " à la Balzac ", that is a novel with interesting, not just embodying everyman protagonist, an interesting and more or less single-minded action and a clear predominance of the authorial narrative situation.

With its relatively unvarnished representation of social reality coined Balzac generations not only by French authors, and prepared the naturalism ago.

His principle of combining a series of novels by a system of recurring characters was picked up by Émile Zola in the Rougon - Macquart cycle.

Works

Plays

• Cromwell, 1820
• Le Nègre, 1823
• Vautrin, 1840
• Paméla Giraud, 1843
• Les Ressources de Quinola, 1842
• La marâtre, 1848
• Mercadet le faiseur, 1840 (1851 posthumously premiered )

Juvenilia

The early works published under the pseudonyms Balzac Lord R'Hoone and Horace de Saint- Aubin. He has these novels later not recognized and they do not belong to the Comédie humaine, but in the motives and also people from these publications will be taken up again.

• Sténie, 1819
• Falthurne, 1822
• Le Vicaire des Ardennes, 1822 ( Horace de Saint- Aubin )
• L' Héritière de Birague, 1822 (Lord R'Hoone )
• Clotilde de Lusignan, 1823 (Lord R'Hoone )
• Annette et le criminel, 1824 ( Horace de Saint- Aubin )
• Le Centenaire ou les deux Bering Held, 1824 ( Horace de Saint- Aubin )
• When - chlorines, 1825 ( Horace de Saint- Aubin )

La Comédie humaine

( Chronological order, assignment to the Scènes in the article La Comédie humaine )

• Le dernier Chouan ou la Bretagne en 1800 novel 1829 (Eng. The last Chouan or Brittany in 1800, 1841)
• Physiologie du mariage, Treatise 1829 (German Physiology of Marriage, 1842)
• Adieu, amendment 1830 ( German Farewell, 1908)
• Le bal de Sceaux, narration 1830 (Eng. The ball of Sceaux, 1900)
• Étude de femme, narration 1830 ( German Women's Studies, 1841)
• Gobseck, narration 1830 ( German Gobseck, 1846)

• La maison du Chat - qui - pelote, narration 1830 ( German House " to ball -playing cat ", 1845)
• Une passion dans le Désert, amendment 1830 ( German Passion in the Desert, 1908)
• Petites misères de la vie conjugale, narration 1830 ( German Small hardships of married life, 1847)
• Sarrasine, narration 1830 ( German Sarrasine, 1912)
• La vendetta, narration 1830 ( German Vendetta, 1841-46 )
• Une famille double, narration 1830 ( German A double family)
• La Paix du ménage story 1830 ( German marriage peace )
• L' auberge rouge, narration 1831 (German Red Lodge, 1924)
• Le chef - d'oeuvre inconnu, narration 1831 (Eng. The Unknown Masterpiece, 1925),
• La peau de chagrin, Roman 1831 (Eng. The shagreen, 1841)
• L' enfant maudit, narration 1831 (Eng. The Cursed Child, 1831)
• L' Élixir de longue vie, narration 1831 (Eng. The elixir of life )
• Les proscrits, narration 1831 (Eng. The Outlaw, 1836)
• El Verdugo, narration 1831 (Eng. El Verdugo )
• Jésus-Christ en Flandre, narration 1831 (Eng. Jesus Christ in Flanders)
• La bourse, narration 1832 (Eng. The Exchange, 1958)
• Le Curé de Tours, narration 1832 (Eng. The Vicar of Tours, 1924)
• Le Colonel Chabert, narration 1832 (German Colonel Chabert, 1844)
• La femme abandonnée, narration 1832 (Eng. The deserted wife, 1846)
• La Grenadière, narration 1832 (German Grenadiers, 1845)
• Louis Lambert, Roman 1832 (German Louis Lambert, 1845)
• Madame Firmiani, Roman 1832 (German Madame Firmiani )
• Le Réquisitionnaire, Roman 1832 (Eng. The Broken Botene )
• Maître Cornélius, Roman 1832 (German champion Cornelius )
• L' illustrious Gaudissart, narration 1833 (Eng. The famous Gaudissart, 1846)
• Le médecin de campagne, Roman 1833 (Eng. The Country Doctor, 1835)
• Le Message, Roman 1833 (German Embassy )
• Gaudissart II, Roman 1834 (German Gaudissart II)
• Eugénie Grandet, Roman 1834 (German Eugénie Grandet, 1835)
• La recherche de l' absolu, Roman 1834 (Eng. The search for the absolute, 1841-46 )
• Le Père Goriot, Roman 1834/35 (German Father Goriot, 1835)
• Histoire des treize, short stories 1843 (German history of the Thirteen, 1909) Ferragus, narration 1834 (German Ferragus )
• La duchesse de Langeais, narration 1834 (Eng. The Duchess of Langeais )
• La fille aux yeux d'or, narration 1835 (Eng. The Girl with the Golden Eyes )

Other works outside the Comédie humaine

• Voyage de Paris à Java, 1830
• La Comédie du diable, 1831
• La Chine et les chinois, 1842
• Les contes drolatiques, 1832-37 (German Toll Bold stories )
• Scènes de la vie privée et publique des animaux, 1840 - 1842 Les Amours de deux bêtes offerts en exemple aux gens d' esprit
• Voyage d'un lion d' Afrique à Paris et ce qui s'ensuivit
• Guide âne à l' usage des animaux qui veulent parvenir aux honneurs
• Voyage d'un moineau de Paris à la recherche du meilleur gouvernement

Films (selection)

• Adieu, film: 1812, Germany in 1923 (directed by J. Berger)
• Gobseck, film adaptations of Germany 1923 (directed by P. Rist ), USSR in 1936 (directed by K. Eggert )
• L' auberge rouge, 0 filming: France 1922/23 ( Directed by Jean Epstein ), France, 1951 ( directed by Claude Autant - Lara )
• Le chef - d'oeuvre inconnu, film: La belle noiseuse, France 1992 ( directed by Jacques Rivette )
• La peau de chagrin, Filmed: France in 1909 or 1911 (directed by M. Carré ), slave of desire, USA 1923 ( Director DG Baker), The sinister desires, Germany in 1939 (directed by H. Hilpert ), La piel de Zapa, Argentina 1943 (directed by Mr. B.
• Le Colonel Chabert, film adaptations: France 1910 (directed by André Calmette ), Germany 1920 ( directed by E. Burg ), Italy 1920 ( Directed by C. gallon), man with no name, Germany 1932 ( Directed by Gustav Ucicky ), France in 1943 (directed by R. Le Hénaff ), Germany, in 1956 ( directed by V. of Collande ), West Germany 1967 ( TV, directed by L. Cremer ), France, 1994 ( directed by Yves Angelo )
• Les contes drolatiques, adaptation: The foolhardy stories, West Germany in 1968 (directed by J. Zachar )
• Eugénie Grandet, film adaptations: The Conquering Power, USA 1921 ( Director Rex Ingram ), Italy, 1946 ( Directed by M. Soldati ), Mexico, 1952 ( directed by E. Gómez Muriel ), Our dear Miss Grandet, West Germany 1965 ( TV Director G. Fleckenstein )
• Le Père Goriot, Filmed: USA 1915, France 1921/22, (Director Jacques de Baroncelli ), Paris at Midnight, USA 1926 (directed by E. Mason Hopper), France in 1944 (directed by R. Vernay ), career in Paris, DDR 1951 ( directed by George C. clear )
• La duchesse de Langeais, film adaptations: France 1910 (directed by André Calmette ), The Eternal Flame, USA 1922 ( Director F. Lloyd), Germany 1927 ( Directed by Paul Czinner ), France 1942 ( directed by Jacques de Baroncelli ), Ne Touchez pas la hache, France in 2007 (directed by Jacques Rivette )
• La fille aux yeux d'or, film: France, 1961 ( Directed by IG Albicocco )
• Un drame au bord de la mer, filming L' homme du large, France 1920 ( Directed by Marcel L' Herbier )
• SERAPHITA, filming: Himself as Herself, USA 1966/67 ( Directed GJ Markopoulos )
• Histoire de la grandeur et de la decadence de Cesar Birotteau, film adaptations: France 1911 (directed by E. Chautard ), Italy 1921 ( directed by A. Fratelli )
• Splendeurs et misères of Courtisanes, filming: splendor and misery of courtesans, Germany in 1927 (directed by Manfred Noa )
• Beatrix ou les amours Forces, filming: Beatrice, Italy 1920 ( directed by Herbert Brenon )
• Pierrette, filming: Gli Amori di Dafne, Italy 1970 ( Director O. Brazzi )
• La fausse maitresse, film: France 1942 ( directed by A. Cayatte )
• La rabouilleuse, Filmed: France 1943 (directed by F. Rivers ), Les arrivistes, France 1959/60 ( Directed by L. Daquin ), Troubled Waters, Germany, 1960 ( Directed by L. Daquin )
• La Cousine Bette, film adaptations: France 1928 (directed by M. de Rieux ), France 1966 ( TV Director Y.-A. Hubert ), USA 1998 (directed by Des McAnuff )
• Le cousin Pons ou les deux musiciens, film: France 1924

Musical settings (selection)

• SERAPHITA, Ruggiero Leoncavallo, symphonic poem, 1894
• La peau de chagrin, opera in seven scenes of Fritz Geissler to a libretto by Günther Deicke, 1977/78
• Colonel Chabert, opera by Wolfgang Hermann Walter Hausen, world premiere January 18, 1912 in Frankfurt am Main.

German total expenditure (selection)

• Complete Works, 82 volumes, Basse -Verlag, Quedlinburg 1841-46
• The Human Comedy, 16 volumes, Island, Leipzig 1908-11
• Collected Works, 44 volumes, Rowohlt, Berlin, 1923-26, reprint Hamburg 1952-55. Teilreprint 40 1 volumes, Diogenes, Zurich 1977, new edition 1998.
• The Human Comedy eds. Fritz -Georg Voigt, small print Edition in 20 volumes, Aufbau-Verlag, Berlin and Weimar 1961-1985
• The Human Comedy, ed Ernst Sander, 12 volumes, Goldmann, Munich 1971-72. Paperback edition Btb, Berlin 1998