Honoré de Balzac
GENIUS

Gifted Honoré de Balzac, also called The Shakespeare of the Novel, was in reality Honoré Balssa and lived 1799 - 1850.

Honoré was a French novelist and creator of The Human Comedy (La Comédie humaine), which contains around 90 novels, 2,472 named characters, and 566 unnamed characters. This man, and Fanny Ardant of course, are your number one reasons for studying the French language.
 

HONORE BALZAC SIGNATURE

Favorite quote from Cousin Bette,

"She examined Crevel in the mirror, and was, like all women of her sort, annoyed to see - although she still knew nothing of the occasion - that he was under the stress of an emotion of which she was not the cause."

Honoré Balssa had to look bankruptcy deep in the eye before he managed to focus and become one of the most illustrious celebrities in Paris. This didn't happen by accident. Smart Honore knew that his brain was in a league of its own and he decided to cash in on it.

He adopted the name Balzac, an old aristocratic family's name, a family to which he didn't have any connection whatsoever, and he throw in the "de" in front of it, for good measure.

It worked brilliantly.  The man worked like a horse, partied like a skunk, womanized like a rabbit, and threw money around like crazy.

He eventually fell in love with Éveline Hanska, a Countess and Polish, but chick was first married and afterwards still hesitant, so it took the good guy 18 years until she finally agreed to marry him. The big event took place in March 1850. But by then Balzac was spent. He died shortly after, in August 1850.

Besides enormous, Balzac's literary output is witty, energetic, clever, and skilled. There might be weaknesses in his style, but you will never find them because the rest is so brilliant. What a guy!

Balzac's sister Laure became his first biographer.

HONORE DE BALZAC

Here, you can read many of his works online for free,
some in French, some in English.

And here is the Honore de Balzac timeline.

HONORE DE BALZAC