Honoré de Balzac

At the shabby boarding house in the rue Neuve-Sainte-Genevieve, petty Madame Vauquer and her tenants wonder at the plight of the aging resident Goriot. Once a well-heeled merchant, Goriot was--at first--afforded special treatment from the Madame. But now something is clearly amiss in his financial affairs, and his increasingly tawdry appearance makes him a subject of ridicule in the household. Some think he lost in the markets, others see him as a...

Written in just fifty-two days in the year 1839, "The Charterhouse of Parma" has since become known as Stendhal's finest work. Evidence of haste is infrequently apparent in this remarkable story, which follows the eventful life of the young Italian nobleman Fabrizio del Dongo. From his childhood in the family castle by Lake Como to the battlefields of Waterloo, Fabrizio proves himself charmingly headstrong and painfully naïve. Upon returning injured...

Balzac's universally loved novel explores the great theme of money and its effect on the human character. Old Goriot is a lodger at Madame Vauquer's Parisian boarding house. At first, his wealth inspires respect, but as his circumstances are reduced, he is gradually shunned. He moves into smaller and less desirable rooms in the house, and soon his only remaining visitors are two beautiful young women. The mystery as to who they are and what is happening...

This tale of misguided passion centers on a young aristocrat who falls into a cloaked, coded entanglement with an older countess--a relationship upended when he becomes involved with a new lover. Felix de Vandenesse, the shy teenaged son of an aristocratic family, is at a ball when his eyes are drawn to a beautiful woman in fashionable undress: Before he knows what he is doing, he throws himself on her, covering her bare back with kisses. In shock,...

Eugene wants to get on in the world. So he has come to Paris, where the streets teem with chancers, criminals, and social climbers--and everyone is out for what he can get. When he finds a place to stay at a shabby boarding house, he sees the potential to make a fortune in two beautiful, aristocratic women who visit the lonely old lodger Goriot. Could they bring Eugene the status and acceptance he craves? Nothing is as it seems in Paris, however,...