Lost Illusions

Lost Illusions

The Project Gutenberg EBook of Lost Illusions, by Honore De Balzac
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Title: Lost Illusions
Author: Honore De Balzac
Release Date: August 11, 2004 [EBook #13159]
Language: English
Character set encoding: ASCII
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ILLUSIONS ***

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LOST ILLUSIONS
BY
HONORE DE BALZAC

PREPARER'S NOTE
The trilogy known as Lost Illusions consists of: Two Poets A
Distinguished Provincial at Paris Eve and David
In many references parts one and three are combined under the title
Lost Illusions and A Distinguished Provincial at Paris is given its

individual title. Following this trilogy is a sequel, Scenes from a
Courtesan's Life, which is set directly following the end of Eve and
David.

LOST ILLUSIONS

INTRODUCTION

The longest, without exception, of Balzac's books, and one which
contains hardly any passage that is not very nearly of his best, Illusions
Perdues suffers, I think, a little in point of composition from the
mixture of the Angouleme scenes of its first and third parts with the
purely Parisian interest of Un Grand Homme de Province. It is hardly
possible to exaggerate the gain in distinctness and lucidity of
arrangement derived from putting Les Deux Poetes and Eve et David (a
much better title than that which has been preferred in the _Edition
Definitive_) together in one volume, and reserving the greatness and
decadence of Lucien de Rubempre for another. It is distinctly awkward
that this should be divided, as it is itself an enormous episode, a sort of
Herodotean parenthesis, rather than an integral part of the story. And,
as a matter of fact, it joins on much more to the Splendeurs et Miseres
des Courtisanes than to its actual companions. In fact, it is an instance
of the somewhat haphazard and arbitrary way in which the actual
division of the Comedie has worked, that it should, dealing as it does
wholly and solely with Parisian life, be put in the Scenes de la Vie de
Province, and should be separated from its natural conclusion not
merely as a matter of volumes, but as a matter of divisions. In making
the arrangement, however, it is necessary to remember Balzac's own
scheme, especially as the connection of the three parts in other ways is
too close to permit the wrenching of them asunder altogether and
finally. This caution given, all that is necessary can be done by
devoting the first part of the introduction entirely to the first and third
or Angouleme parts, and by consecrating the latter part to the egregious
Lucien by himself.
There is a double gain in doing this, for, independently of the
connection as above referred to, Lucien has little to do except as an
opportunity for the display of virtue by his sister and David Sechard;

and the parts in which they appear are among the most interesting of
Balzac's work. The "Idyllic" charm of this marriage for love, combined
as it is with exhibitions of the author's power in more than one of the
ways in which he loved best to show it, has never escaped attention
from Balzac's most competent critics. He himself had speculated in
print and paper before David Sechard was conceived; he himself had
for all "maniacs," all men of one idea, the fraternal enthusiasm of a
fellow-victim. He could never touch a miser without a sort of shudder
of interest; and that singular fancy of his for describing complicated
legal and commercial undertakings came in too. Nor did he spare, in
this wide-ranging book, to bring in other favorite matters of his, the
_hobereau_--or squireen--aristocracy, the tittle-tattle of the country
town and so forth.
The result is a book of multifarious interest, not hampered, as some of
its fellows are, by an uncertainty on the author's part as to what
particular hare he is coursing. Part of the interest, after the description
of the printing office and of old Sechard's swindling of his son, is a
doubling, it is true, upon that of La muse du Departement, and is
perhaps a little less amusingly done; but it is blended with better
matters. Sixte du Chatelet is a considerable addition to Balzac's gallery
of the aristocracy in transition--of the Bonaparte parvenus whom
perhaps he understood even better than the old nobility, for they were
already in his time becoming adulterated and alloyed; or than the new
folk of business and finance, for they were but in their earliest stages.
Nor is the rest of the society of