Honoré de Balzac
Author
Publisher
SAGA Egmont
Pub. Date
2022
Language
English
Formats
Description
If you have seen Ricky Gervais in 'The Office', you will know how much comedy and pathos occurs in apparently mundane locations. In 'The Lesser Bourgeoisie', Honore de Balzac turns his sharp eye on the intrigues of the white-collar world.Spinster Marie-Jeanne-Brigitte Thuillier has made money from selling her bank business. She dedicates her life to supporting her brother, an attractive but mediocre man with an illegitimate daughter, Celeste.Celeste's...
Author
Language
Portuguese
Description
«Eugénie Grandet» é uma das obras mais famosas de Balzac e conta a história de um amor frustrado entre uma jovem provinciana de 23 anos e seu primo parisiense.
Embora a narrativa seja simples, retrata fielmente a escalada individualista de um plebeu que nada mais consegue ver e valorizar além do brilho do ouro. Assim é o pai de Eugénie, o senhor Grandet, um homem ambicioso e sem escrúpulos que coloca a ascensão social e financeira acima...
Author
Publisher
SAGA Egmont
Pub. Date
2022
Language
English
Description
The old, abandoned manor of La Grande Bretèche stands between the trees like a secret. Uncovered one day by Dr. Horace Bianchon whilst visiting the nearby town of Vendôme, the ruins will beckon any wandering visitor in.Full of intrigue, the doctor simply can't resist entering the house. But night after night, he fails. Why can't La Grande Bretèche be accessed? And what do the locals know of this mysterious shelter? Adapted into 3 films, 2 episodes,...
Author
Publisher
SAGA Egmont
Pub. Date
2022
Language
English
Description
Judges receive legal training, but they cannot automatically be given courage and the wisdom of Solomon.That is what is needed when larger-than-life socialite the Marquise d'Espard petitions Judge Jean-Jules Popinot to declare her husband mad.He is not mad, of course. But she is - mad that he is spending their money on another family. As the judge digs deeper, he discovers the heartbreaking reason why the Marquis was helping the Jeanrenauds. With...
6) Facino Cane
Author
Publisher
SAGA Egmont
Pub. Date
2021
Language
English
Description
The novella unfolds around a blind old man, Facino Cane who claims to be a descendant of the 14th century condottiere of the same name. The narrator meets Facino Cane at a wedding, and begins a conversation with him. Facino then recounts his life story involving the most extraordinary tales of murder, exile, buried treasure, incarceration and a daring escape.A thoroughly enticing and enthralling short story, with a narrator that has a magnificent...
7) Honorine
Author
Publisher
SAGA Egmont
Pub. Date
2021
Language
English
Description
Exquisitely deploying the story-within-a-story narrative, 'Honorine' is a tale casting piercing insight into the fabric of the human condition. Comtesse Honorine de Bauvan was married off to the Comte at the age of nineteen. After being unfaithful, she is abandoned by her lover when she falls pregnant. She leads a simple but comfortable life and earns a living by crafting artificial flowers. What she doesn't know is that her comfort is assured by...
8) Gobseck
Author
Publisher
SAGA Egmont
Pub. Date
2022
Language
English
Description
An ambitious lawyer, a scandalous family secret, and a loan shark. Take these three elements and paint them onto a backdrop of upper-class Paris and you have Honore de Balzac's 'Gobseck'.The lawyer just happens to act for the loan shark, and he knows the secret that Anastasie de Restaud, who has married into the aristocracy, is having an affair and blowing her money on her lover.Which financial strings can the lawyer and loan shark pull? And who will...
9) Gambara
Author
Publisher
SAGA Egmont
Pub. Date
2022
Language
English
Description
When Milanese nobleman Count Andrea Marcosini sees Marianna in the crowd at the Palais-Royal in Paris, he immediately decides that she will be his. After all, this wealthy man with a wandering eye is used to getting what he wants.However, she is married to a composer called "Gambara", whose music reaches heights of beauty - but only when he is drunk. The count gives them money, then gives him a drink, and then, finally, steals Marianna from him.It...
10) Gaudissart II
Author
Publisher
SAGA Egmont
Pub. Date
2022
Language
English
Description
It is sometimes difficult to know who most deserves our judgement.Do we look down more upon a shop owner for inventing a royal backstory for one of his items - or is the customer who believes the story even worse?Set in 19th century Paris, Honoré de Balzac's short story sees an English woman looking to buy a shawl in a shop.The owner sees a chance to con a foreigner by claiming the shawl was once owned by Empress Josephine, once the wife of Napoleon...
11) The Message
Author
Publisher
SAGA Egmont
Pub. Date
2022
Language
English
Description
It begins with the undignified scene of two young men on a Parisian stagecoach, boasting about their love affairs with older, married women.Hubris turns to tragedy when the coach overturns, leaving one of the men with fatal injuries. However, drama dictates that there is always time for some final words before death. The dying man gives his travelling companion a mission - collect love letters from his house and deliver them to his lover, a countess.How...
12) The Exiles
Author
Publisher
SAGA Egmont
Pub. Date
2022
Language
English
Description
Superstition, sorcery, dark strangers, and a great poet in disguise, Honoré de Balzac takes a new turn in 'The Exiles'.Set in 14th century Paris, this novella sees sergeant Tirechair host two strangers at his house near Notre-Dame. One is a regular at the royal court, while the younger man is the son of a countess. Both of them spook the sergeant, as he believes they are sorcerers - and they are clearly incognito. As he gets ready to throw them out,...
Author
Publisher
SAGA Egmont
Pub. Date
2021
Language
English
Description
A short story ushering the reader into the violent and horrifying events that took place during the Reign of Terror following the French Revolution. The tale follows an old ex-Carmelite nun who is hiding from Robespierre with abject fear of what tomorrow may bring. Oozing with mystery and suspense, Balzac's allegorical prose is at its very finest here. The French author who, along with Flaubert, is widely regarded to be one of the founding fathers...
14) Juana
Author
Publisher
SAGA Egmont
Pub. Date
2022
Language
English
Description
An Italian and Spanish love triangle with Napoleon's army on the march as the backdrop, 'Juana' is an all-action story about two morally corrupt Italian soldiers in the French army in Spain.They lurk at the rear of the army and descend upon the women and the wealth of defeated towns. As they enter Tarragona, Montefiore spots the lovely Juana and sets about seducing her by inveigling himself with her family.They fall for each other, but Montefiore...
Author
Publisher
SAGA Egmont
Pub. Date
2021
Language
English
Description
In 'Ferragus, Chief of the Devorants' Balzac skillfully traces a dazzling panorama of 19th century Parisian streets and vividly invokes a sparkling menagerie of characters in ultra-fine detail.A young cavalry officer strolls down these very streets when he spots a beautiful lady in the company of an ill-reputed man. The man is veiled in an impenetrable cloak of secrecy, which also raises questions about the woman at his side, transforming the novel...
16) Study of a Woman
Author
Publisher
SAGA Egmont
Pub. Date
2022
Language
English
Description
You know that feeling when you have just sent a text or an email to the wrong person? Well, in the 19th century the equivalent was a wrongly-directed letter - and there is no 'delete' button for pen and paper.The faux pas happens after Eugene de Rastignac briefly meets married society woman Madame de Listomere at a soiree. The following day, Rastignac writes a love letter to his sweetheart - but accidentally sends it to Mme Listomere!Beneath the surface,...
Author
Publisher
SAGA Egmont
Pub. Date
2021
Language
English
Description
Due to Balzac's death in 1850, 'The Deputy of Arcis' was left incomplete at its most compelling moment. A political satire criticizing the electoral system, taking place in the provinces of southern France and revolving around a fierce electoral dispute. But the arrival of a mysterious man changes everything - is it for better or worse?Balzac's creative genius, combined with a humourous and ironic narrative makes this read thoroughly entertaining...
Author
Publisher
SAGA Egmont
Pub. Date
2022
Language
English
Description
Veronique Graslin is a woman of strength.Despite being scarred by smallpox at 11, and then railroaded into a miserable marriage with a man who resembles an "antique satyr", she builds a life of wealth and good works in the French countryside.But, nibbling away at her conscience like a persistent rat, there is a dark secret that will not let her go.After Veronique encounters two criminals, as well as Monsieur Bonnet, the insightful rector, she feels...
Author
Publisher
SAGA Egmont
Pub. Date
2022
Language
English
Description
Felix was rejected as a child by his mother and those scars never fully heal.In a book with great emotional depth, Honore de Balzac explores Felix' two major adult relationships with women through the form of a single letter. With the beautiful, but married, Madame Mortsauf, maternal love grows into a passion - but never crosses into physical infidelity. As the years pass by, Felix falls for sensuous Englishwoman Lady Arabelle.Torn between "the wife...
20) Love in a Mask
Author
Publisher
SAGA Egmont
Pub. Date
2022
Language
English
Description
"Now that I am free, perfectly free, I intend to remain so."Today, this would be a clear message to look for another online date.In 19th-century Paris, Leon de Preval, a captain in the Sixth Horse, does not take the hint. The focus of his intrigue is a mysterious young widow in a mask, who is enjoying the freedom that the death of her controlling husband has allowed her.The woman's identity remains a secret, but they meet a few weeks later at another...