In the definitive edition of Balzac's writings in twenty-four volumes, seventeen are occupied by the various divisions of the 'Comédie humaine.' The plays take up one volume; and the correspondence, not including of course the letters to "L'Étrangère," another; the 'Contes drolatiques' make still another; and finally we have four volumes filled with sketches, tales, reviews, and historical and political articles left uncollected by their author.
The 'Contes' are thirty in number, divided into "dixains," each with its appropriate prologue and epilogue. They purport to have been collected in the abbeys of Touraine, and set forth by the Sieur de Balzac for the delight of Pantagruelists and none others. Not merely the spirit but the very language of Rabelais is caught with remarkable verve and fidelity, so that from the point of view of style Balzac has never done better work. A book which holds by Rabelais on the one hand and by the Queen of Navarre on the other is not likely, however, to appeal to that part of the English and American reading public that expurgates its Chaucer, and blushes at the mention of Fielding and Smollett. Such readers will do well to avoid the 'Contes drolatiques;' although, like 'Don Juan,' they contain a great deal of what was best in their author, of his frank, ebullient, sensuous nature, lighted up here at least by a genuine if scarcely delicate humor. Of direct suggestion of vice Balzac was, naturally, as incapable as he was of smug puritanism; but it must be confessed that as a raconteur his proper audience, now that the monastic orders have passed away, would be a group of middle-aged club-men.
The 'Comédie humaine' is divided into three main sections: first and most important, the 'Études de moeurs' (Studies of Manners), second the 'Études philosophiques' (Philosophic Studies), and finally the 'Études analytiques' (Analytic Studies). These divisions, as M. Barrière points out in his 'L'Oeuvre de H. de Balzac' (The Work of Balzac), were intended to bear to one another the relations that moral science, psychology, and metaphysics do to one another with regard to the life of man, whether as an individual or as a member of society. No single division was left complete at the author's death; but enough was finished and put together to give us the sense of moving in a living, breathing world, no matter where we make our entry. This, as we have insisted, is the real secret of his greatness. To think, for example, that the importance of 'Séraphita' lies in the fact that it gives Balzac's view of Swedenborgianism, or that the importance of 'Louis Lambert' lies in its author's queer theories about the human will, is entirely to misapprehend his true position in the world of literature. His mysticism, his psychology, his theories of economics, his reactionary devotion to monarchy, and his idealization of the Church of Rome, may or may not appeal to us, and have certainly nothing that is eternal or inevitable about them; but in his knowledge of the human mind and heart he is as inevitable and eternal as any writer has ever been, save only Shakespeare and Homer.
The 'Études de moeurs' were systematically divided by their author into 'Scenes of Private Life,' 'Scenes of Provincial Life,' 'Scenes of Country Life,' 'Scenes of Parisian Life,' 'Scenes of Political Life,' and 'Scenes of Military Life,'--the last three divisions representing more or less exceptional phases of existence. The group relating to Paris is by far the most important and powerful, but the provincial stories show almost as fine workmanship, and furnish not a few of the well-known masterpieces. Less interesting, though still important, are the 'Scenes of Private Life,' which consist of twenty-four novels, novelettes, and tales, under the following titles: 'Béatrix,' 'Albert Savarus,' 'La Fausse maitresse' (The False Mistress), 'Le Message' (The Message), 'La Grande Bretèche,' 'Étude de femme' (Study of Woman), 'Autre étude de femme' (Another Story of Woman), 'Madame Firmiani,' 'Modeste Mignon,' 'Un Début dans la vie' (An Entrance upon Life), 'Pierre Grassou,' 'Mémoires de deux jeunes mariées' (Recollections of a Young Couple), 'La Maison du chat-qui-pelote,' 'Le Bal de Sceaux' (The Ball of Sceaux), 'Le Contrat de mariage' (The Marriage Contract), 'La Vendetta,' 'La Paix du ménage' (Household Peace), 'Une Double famille' (A Double Family), 'Une Fille d'Éve' (A Daughter of Eve), 'Honorine,' 'La Femme abandonnée' (The Abandoned Wife), 'La Grenadière,' 'La Femme de trente ans' (The Woman of Thirty).
Of all these stories, hardly one shows genuine greatness except the powerful tragic tale 'La Grande Bretèche,' which was subsequently incorporated in 'Autre étude de femme,' This story of a jealous husband's walling up his wife's lover in a closet of her chamber is as dramatic a piece of writing as Balzac ever did, and is almost if not quite as perfect a short story as any that has since been written in France. 'La Maison du chat-qui-pelote' has been mentioned already on account of its importance in the evolution of Balzac's realism, but while a delightful novelette, it is hardly great, its charm coming rather from its descriptions of bourgeois life than from the working out of its central theme, the infelicity of a young wife married to an unfaithful artist. 'Modeste Mignon' is interesting, and more romantic than Balzac's later works were wont to be; but while it may be safely recommended to the average novel-reader, few admirers of its author would wish to have it taken as a sample of their master. 'Béatrix' is a powerful story in its delineation of the weakness of the young Breton nobleman, Calyste du Guénie. It derives a factitious interest from the fact that George Sand is depicted in 'Camille Maupin,' the nom de plume of Mlle. des Touches, and perhaps Balzac himself in Claude Vignon, the critic. Less factitious is the interest derived from Balzac's admirable delineation of a doting mother and aunt, and from his realistic handling of one of the cleverest of his ladies of light reputation, Madame Schontz; his studies of such characters of the demi-monde--especially of the wonderful Esther of the 'Splendeurs et misères'--serving plainly, by the way, as a point of departure for Dumas fils. Yet 'Béatrix' is an able rather than a truly great book, for it neither elevates nor delights us. In fact, all the stories in this series are interesting rather than truly great; but all display Balzac's remarkable analytic powers. Love, false or true, is of course their main theme; wrought out to a happy issue in 'La Bourse,' a charming tale, or to a death of despair in 'La Grenadière' The childless young married woman is contrasted with her more fortunate friend surrounded by little ones ('Mémoires de deux jeunes mariées'), the heartless coquette flirts once too often ('Le Bal de Sceaux'), the eligible young man is taken in by a scheming mother ('Le Contrat du mariage'), the deserted husband labors to win back his wife ('Honorine'), the tempted wife learns at last the real nature of her peril ('Une Fille d'Éve'); in short, lovers and mistresses, husbands and wives, make us participants of all the joys and sorrows that form a miniature world within the four walls of every house.
The 'Scenes of Provincial Life' number only ten stories, but nearly all of them are masterpieces. They are 'Eugénie Grandet,' 'Le Lys dans la vallée,' 'Ursule Mirouet,' 'Pierrette,' 'Le Curé de Tours,' 'La Rabouilleuse,' 'La Vielle fille' (The Old Maid), 'Le Cabinet des antiques' (The Cabinet of Antiques), 'L'Illustre Gaudissart' (The Illustrious Gaudissart), and 'La Muse du département' (The Departmental Muse). Of these 'Eugénie Grandet' is of course easily first in interest, pathos, and power. The character of old Grandet, the miserly father, is presented to us with Shakespearean vividness, although Eugénie herself has, less than the Shakespearean charm. Any lesser artist would have made the tyrant himself and his yielding wife and daughters seem caricatures rather than living people. It is only the Shakespeares and Balzacs who are able to make their Shylocks and lagos, their Grandets and Philippe Brideaus, monsters and human beings at one and the same time. It is only the greater artists, too, who can bring out all the pathos inherent in the subjection of two gentle women to a tyrant in their own household. But it is Balzac the inimitable alone who can portray fully the life of the provinces, its banality, its meanness, its watchful selfishness, and yet save us through the perfection of his art from the degradation which results from contact with low and sordid life. The reader who rises unaffected from a perusal of 'Eugénie Grandet' would be unmoved by the grief of Priam in the tent of Achilles, or of Othello in the death-chamber of Desdemona.
'Le Lys dans la vallée' has been pronounced by an able French critic to be the worst novel he knows; but as a study of more or less ethereal and slightly morbid love it is characterized by remarkable power. Its heroine, Madame Mortsauf, tied to a nearly insane husband and pursued by a sentimental lover, undergoes tortures of conscience through an agonizing sense of half-failure in her duty. Balzac himself used to cite her when he was charged with not being able to draw a pure woman; but he has created nobler types. The other stories of the group are also decidedly more interesting. The distress of the abbé Birotteau over his landlady's treatment, and the intrigues of the abbé Troubert ('Le Curé de Tours') absorb us as completely as the career of Caesar himself in Mommsen's famous chapter. The woes of the little orphan subjected to the tyranny of her selfish aunt and uncle ('Pierrette'), the struggles of the rapacious heirs for the Mirouet fortune ('Ursule Mirouet,') a story which gives us one of Balzac's purest women, treats interestingly of mesmerism (and may be read without fear by the young), the siege of Mlle. Cormon's mature affections by her two adroit suitors ('Une Vielle fille'), the intrigues against the peace of the d'Esgrignons and the sublime devotion to their interests of the notary Chesnel ('Le Cabinet des antiques'), and finally the ignoble passions that fought themselves out around the senile Jean Jacques Rouget, under the direction of the diabolical ex-soldier Philippe Brideau ('La Rabouilleuse,' sometimes entitled 'Un Ménage de Garcon'), form the absorbing central themes of a group of novels--or rather stories, for few of them attain considerable length--unrivaled in the annals of realistic fiction.
The 'Scenes of Country Life,' comprising 'Les Paysans,' 'Le Médecin de campagne,' and 'Le Curé de village' (The Village Priest), take high rank among their author's works. Where Balzac might have been crudely naturalistic, he has preferred to be either realistic as in the first named admirable novel, or idealistic as in the two latter. Hence he has created characters like the country physician, Doctor Benassis, almost as great a boon to the world of readers as that philanthropist himself was to the little village of his adoption. If Madame Graslin of 'Le Curé de village' fails to reach the height of Benassis, her career has at least a sensational interest which his lacked; and the country curate, the good abbé Bonnet, surely makes up for her lack on the ideal side. This story, by the way, is important for the light it throws on the workings of the Roman Church among the common people; and the description of Madame Graslin's death is one of Balzac's most effective pieces of writing.
We are now brought to the 'Parisian Scenes,' and with the exception of 'Eugénie Grandet,' to the best-known masterpieces. There are twenty titles; but as two of these are collective in character, the number of novels and stories amounts to twenty-four, as follows:--'Le Père Goriot,' 'Illusions perdues,' 'Splendeurs et misères des courtisanes,' 'Les Secrets de la princesse de Cadignan' (The Secrets of the Princess of Cadignan), 'Histoire des treize' [containing 'Ferragus,' 'La Duchesse de Langeais,' and 'La Fille aux yeux d'or' (The Girl with the Golden Eyes)], 'Sarrasine,' 'Le Colonel Chabert,' 'L'lnterdiction' (The Interdiction), 'Les Parents pauvres' (Poor Relations, including 'La Cousine Bette' and 'Le Cousin Pons'), 'La Messe de l'athée' (The Atheist's Mass), 'Facino Cane,' 'Gobseck,' 'La Maison Nucingen,' 'Un Prince de la Bohème' (A Prince of Bohemia), 'Esquisse d'homme d'affaires' (Sketch of a Business man), 'Gaudissart II.' 'Les Comédiens sans le savoir' (The Unconscious Humorists), 'Les Employés' (The Employees), 'Histoire de César Birotteau,' and 'Les Petits bourgeois' (Little Bourgeois). Of these twenty-four titles six belong to novels, five of which are of great power, nine to novelettes and short stories too admirable to be passed over without notice, eight to novelettes and stories of interest and value which need not, however, detain us, and one, 'Les Petits bourgeois', to a novel of much promise unfortunately left incomplete. 'Les Secrets de la princesse de Cadignan' is remarkable chiefly as a study of the blind passion that often overtakes a man of letters. Daniel d'Arthez, the author, a fine character and a favorite with Balzac, succumbs to the wiles of the Princess of Cadignan (formerly the dashing and fascinating Duchesse de Maufrigneuse) and is happy in his subjection. The 'Histoire des treize' contains three novelettes, linked together through the fact that in each a band of thirteen young men, sworn to assist one another in conquering society, play an important part. This volume is the most frankly sensational of Balzac's works. 'La Duchesse de Langeais' however, is more than sensational: it gives perhaps Balzac's best description of the Faubourg St. Germain and one of his ablest analyses of feminine character, while in the description of General Montriveau's recognition of the Duchess in the Spanish convent the novelist's dramatic power is seen at its highest. 'La Fille aux yeux d'or,' which concludes the volume devoted to the mysterious brotherhood, may be considered, with 'Sarrasine,' one of the dark closets of the great building known as the 'Comédie humaine.' Both stories deal with unnatural passions, and the first is one of Balzac's most effective compositions. For sheer voluptuousness of style there is little in literature to parallel the description of the boudoir of the uncanny heroine. Very different from these stories is 'Le Colonel Chabert,' the record of the misfortunes of one of Napoleon's heroic soldiers, who after untold hardships returns to France to find his wife married a second time and determined to deny his existence. The law is invoked, but the treachery of the wife induces the noble old man to put an end to the proceedings, after which he sinks into an indigent and pathetic senility. Balzac has never drawn a more heart-moving figure, nor has he ever sounded more thoroughly the depths of human selfishness. But the description of the battle of Eylau and of Chabert's sufferings in retreat would alone suffice to make the story memorable. 'L'Interdiction' is the proper pendant to the history of this unfortunate soldier. In it another husband, the Marquis d'Espard, suffers from the selfishness of his wife, one of the worst characters in the range of Balzac's fiction. That she may keep him from alienating his property to discharge a moral obligation she endeavors to prove him insane. The legal complications which ensue bring forward one of Balzac's great figures, the judge of instruction, Popinot; but to appreciate him the reader must go to the marvelous book itself. 'Gobseck' is a study of a Parisian usurer, almost worthy of a place beside the description of old Grandet; while 'Les Employés' is a realistic study of bureaucratic life, which, besides showing a wonderful familiarity with the details of a world of which Balzac had little personal experience, contains several admirably drawn characters and a sufficient amount of incident. But it is time to leave these sketches and novels in miniature, and to pass by the less important 'Scenes' of this fascinating Parisian life, in order to consider in some detail the five novels of consummate power.
First of these in date of composition, and in popular estimation at least among English readers, comes, 'Le Père Goriot.' It is certainly trite to call the book a French "Lear," but the expression emphasizes the supreme artistic power that could treat the motif of one of Shakespeare's plays in a manner that never forces a disadvantageous comparison with the great tragedy. The retired vermicelli-maker is not as grand a figure as the doting King of Britain, but he is as real. The French daughters, Anastasie, Countess de Restaud, and Delphine, Baroness de Nucingen, are not such types of savage wickedness as Regan and Goneril, but they fit the nineteenth century as well as the British princesses did their more barbarous day. Yet there is no Cordelia in 'Le Père Goriot,' for the pale Victorine Taillefer cannot fill the place of that noblest of daughters. This is but to say that Balzac's bourgeois tragedy lacks that element of the noble that every great poetic tragedy must have. The self-immolation of old Goriot to the cold-hearted ambitions of his daughters is not noble, but his parental passion touches the infinite, and so proves the essential kinship of his creator with the creator of Lear. This touch of the infinite, as in 'Eugénie Grandet,' lifts the book up from the level of a merely masterly study of characters or a merely powerful novel to that of the supreme masterpieces of human genius. The marvelously lifelike description of the vulgar Parisian boarding-house, the fascinating delineation of the character of that king of convicts, Vautrin, and the fine analysis of the ambitions of Rastignac (who comes nearer perhaps to being the hero of the 'Comédie humaine' than any other of its characters, and is here presented to us at the threshold of his successful career) remain in the memory of every reader, but would never alone have sufficed to make Balzac's name worthy of immortality. The infinite quality of Goriot's passion would, however, have conferred this honor on his creator had he never written another book.