No adequate biography of Honoré de Balzac has yet been written ; a fact somewhat strange, considering the interest and attractiveness of the subject and the abundance of the material available. Of ...

Fueled by endless cups of coffee, French author Honoré de Balzac produced more than 90 novels and short stories peopled by 2,400-plus characters during his lifetime (1799-1850). “Balzac’s Lives,” a ...

BALZAC—Rene Benjamin—Knopf ($5). Fiction could be, has been defined as imaginary biography. Biography in its latest form could be defined as imaginary fiction. Into this definition fits the work ...

In our era of boxed-set, television bingeing, it’s astonishing there hasn’t been a revival of Honoré de Balzac’s “Human Comedy.” Did the conclusion of “The Wire” leave you bereft? Here’s a serial that ...

The novelist and short story-writer Honoré de Balzac has long been a fixture in the Penguin Classics range, bound between attractive covers that have been updated, with different illustrations and ...

Teaching Associate French, School of Languages, Arts and Societies., University of Sheffield Most people think originality comes from endless freedom. The role playing game Dungeons & Dragons suggests ...

I can sympathise with you if you find yourself daunted by the idea of reading Balzac's Comédie Humaine. Over 90 volumes written in a mere 20 years: the rate of composition alone is enough to make one ...

The 19th-century novelist Honoré de Balzac was Catholic, French to the core and obsessed with the material details of French society. Yet there is something profoundly Hindu in the way he sought to ...

Art historian’s dissection of famous work is as much about the painting as his decades-long obsession with it.