The Project Gutenberg EBook of Introduction to the Dramas of Balzac, by
Epiphanius Wilson and J. Walker McSpadden

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Title: Introduction to the Dramas of Balzac

Author: Epiphanius Wilson and J. Walker McSpadden

Release Date: February 3, 2006 [EBook #8598]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK DRAMAS OF BALZAC ***

Produced by John Bickers and Dagny

INTRODUCTION TO THE DRAMAS OF BALZAC

BY

EPIPHANIUS WILSON
AND
J. WALKER MCSPADDEN

CONTENTS

Balzac as a Dramatist
By Epiphanius Wilson

Introduction
By J. Walker McSpadden

BALZAC AS A DRAMATIST

BY

EPIPHANIUS WILSON

Honore de Balzac is known to the world in general as a novel-writer, a
producer of romances, in which begin the reign of realism in French
fiction. His _Comedie Humaine_ is a description of French society, as
it existed from the time of the Revolution to that of the Restoration.
In this series of stories we find the author engaged in analyzing the
manners, motives and external life of the French man and woman in all
grades of society. When we open these volumes, we enter a gallery of
striking and varied pictures, which glow with all the color,
chiaroscuro and life-like detail of a Dutch panel. The power of Balzac
is unique as a descriptive writer; his knowledge of the female heart
is more profound, and covers a far wider range than anything exhibited
by a provincial author, such as Richardson. But he has also the
marvelous faculty of suggesting spiritual facts in the life and
consciousness of his characters, by the picturesque touches with which
he brings before us their external surroundings--the towns, streets
and houses in which they dwell; the furniture, ornaments and
arrangement of their rooms, and the clothes they wear. He depends upon
these details for throwing into relief such a portrait as that of Pons
or Madame Hulot. He himself was individualize