Mild, harmless and ugly to behold, the impoverished Pons is an ageing musician whose brief fame has fallen to nothing. Living a placid Parisian life as a bachelor in a shared apartment with his friend Schmucke, he maintains only two passions: a devotion t
This trilogy of stories—Ferragus: Chief of the Companions of Duty, The Duchesse De Langeais, and The Girl with the Golden Eyes—purporting to be the history of a secret society, laid the foundation for Balzac’s Scenes of Parisian Life and is a stunni
Characterized by amoral ruthlessness, the politics of A Murky Business would seem to bear out Balzac's questionable precept.Set earlier than most of Balzac's Comedie Humaine, the novel covers the years 1803-6, when Napolean was making himself first Consul