"You wish to know if I have met Foedora, if she is true? A woman from cold Russia, the Princess Bagration, is supposed in Paris to be the model for her. I have reached the seventy-second woman who has had the impertinence to recognize herself in that character. They are all of ripe age. Even Madame Recamier is willing to /foedorize herself/. Not a word of all that is true. I made Foedora out of two women whom I have known without having been intimate with them. Observation sufficed me, besides a few confidences. There are also some kind souls who will have it that I have courted the handsomest of Parisian courtesans and have concealed myself behind her curtains. These are calumnies. I have met a Foedora; but that one I shall not paint; besides, it has been a long time since /La Peau de Chagrin/ was published."
Quoting Amedee Pichot and Dr. Meniere, S. de Lovenjoul states that Mademoiselle Olympe Pelissier is the woman whom Balzac used as a model for his Foedora, and that, like Raphael, he concealed himself in her bedroom. She is indeed the woman without a heart; she kept in the rue Neuve-du-Luxembourg a salon frequented by noted political people such as the Duc de Fitz-James. Being rich as well as beautiful, and having an exquisite voice, she was highly attractive to the novelist, who aspired to her hand, and who regarded her refusal with bitterness all his life. Several years later she was married to her former voice teacher, M. Rossini.
Balzac met the famous Olympe early in his literary career; he says of her:
"Two years ago, Sue quarreled with a /mauvaise courtesone/ celebrated for her beauty (she is the original of Vernet's /Judith/). I lowered myself to reconcile them, and they gave her to me. M. de Fitz-James, the Duc de Duras, and the old count went to her house to talk, as on neutral ground, much as people walk in the alley of the Tuileries to meet one another; and one expects better conduct of me than of those gentlemen! . . . As for Rossini, I wish him to write me a nice letter, and he has just invited me to dine with his mistress, who happens to be that beautiful /Judith/, the former mistress of Horace Vernet and of Sue you know. . . ."
Some months after this Balzac gave a dinner to his /Tigres/, as he called the group occupying the same box with him at the opera. Concerning this dinner, he writes:
"Next Saturday I give a dinner to the /Tigres/ of my opera-box, and I am preparing sumptuosities out of all reason. I shall have Rossini and Olympe, his /cara dona/, who will preside. . . . My dinner? Why, it made a great excitement. Rossini declared he had never seen eaten or drunk anything better among sovereigns. This dinner was sparkling with wit. The beautiful Olympe was graceful, sensible and perfect."[*]
[*] The present writer has not been able to find any date that would prove positively that Balzac knew Madame Rossini before writing /La Peau de Chagrin/ which appeared in 1830-1831.
Balzac was a great admirer of Rossini, wrote the words for one of his compositions, and dedicated to him /Le Contrat de Mariage/.
Among the famous salons that Balzac frequented was that of Madame Recamier, who was noted even more for her distinction and grace than for her beauty. She appreciated the ability of the young writer, and invited him to read in her salon long before the world recognized his name. He admired her greatly; of one of his visits to her he writes:
"Yesterday I went to see Madame Recamier, whom I found ill but wonderfully bright and kind. I have heard that she did much good, and acted very nobly in being silent and making no complaint of the ungrateful beings she has met. No doubt she saw upon my face a reflection of what I thought of her, and without explaining to herself this little sympathy, she was charming."