HONORE DE BALZAC

Classic French literature. As conceived by the writer of his main work "The Human Comedy" was to consist of 143 books. They were completed 90 books. This is a grand picture of the breadth of French society. He wrote novels "shagreen" (1831), "Eugenie Grandet" (1833), "Father Goriot" (1835), "Lily Valley" (1836), "Lost Illusions" (1835-1843), "Brilliance and poverty Courtesans "(1838-1847), etc.

Honore Balzac was born May 20, 1799 in the city of Tours. His father, Bernard Francois Balzac, the Defense Ministry official involved in the supply of provisions for the division, stationed in the town. He was 53 years old, was born Honore. The mother of the future writer, Anne-Charlotte Salammbo, the daughter of well-bred Parisian bourgeois, was younger than her husband of 32 years. Bernard Francois jokingly boasted about his distant kinship with the name of chivalry drevnegallskoy Balzac d? Antreg. But the son later turn this fantasy into an indisputable fact. "De Balzac. " So he began signing his letters and books, and the arms of Dr. ? Antregov decorated his crew, intending to go to Vienna. Meanwhile, all the extant documents do not support the aristocratic origins Honore.

Early childhood of the future writer was held outside the family home. At first he lived with his nurse, a simple peasant turenskoy. When he was four years old, he was sent to boarding school Lege. Eleven years spent with a few interruptions for Balzac dull walls of various guest houses and boarding. Were the darkest for him seven years in the Vendome college, a private educational institution, directed by monks oratoriantsami. Two hundred students of the college were to unquestioningly obey the harsh monastic regime. For the slightest fault followed by flogging or a dark damp cell. Balzac had few friends. He had a reputation for moody, careless student.

In those years, was introduced to the world Honore books. He became a regular at the library the college. Sam tried to write, but it caused only ridicule his comrades, who gave him the ironic nickname of the poet.

Balzac was fifteen years old when his father was transferred to Paris. It was in 1814. Just collapsed empire of Napoleon. France once again became a kingdom of Bourbon.

At the urging of his father's youth he studied at the Law School and worked in the office of clerk lawyer Gilone de Merville. And a secret from their parents attended lectures on literature at the Sorbonne, the long hours spent in the library of the Arsenal, studying the works of philosophers and historians.

1819 began for his final examinations. Honore graduated law school, but parents suddenly decided to devote himself to literature. At that time my father retired, and his family moved to town Villeparisis, near the capital.

Photo — «Honore De Balzac»

Honore lived in working-class district of Paris and lived in a small attic. He humorously wrote to his sister: "Your brother, destined to such a glory, is powered entirely as a great man, in other words, is dying of hunger. "

The first literary experience in the genre of tragedy was subjected to derogatory criticism of the family council. Honore then drew attention to the "Gothic" novels, where there are heartless villains, committed terrible crimes, sinister secrets are revealed and rewarded the virtuous beauty. First, in collaboration with an experienced businessman Le literary Puatvenom de l? Egrevilem and then independently Balzac over five years produced a dozen novels that did not bring him the long-awaited self-sufficiency.

Up to thirty years, he shunned women. Balzac, the rapid and unrestrained in his mature years, was timid in his youth to the pain. However, he avoided women for fear of falling in love, no, he was afraid of his own passion. In addition, Balzac knew he was short-legged and clumsy by nature, that it will be funny if it becomes like a flaunting of the time, flirt with beautiful women. But this feeling of inferiority forced him to flee again and again from women in seclusion to his desk.

Sometimes Balzac lived with their parents in a small Villeparisis. Here in 1821 he met Laura de Bernis - 45-year-old woman, mother with many very unhappy in his marriage. Her husband, Monsieur Gabriel de Berny, the son of the governor, was an adviser to the imperial court, scion of an ancient noble family. Every day he saw a worse and worse. Balzac Honore's mother made the deal with the son of Laura and Alexander. They were almost the same age. Soon Madame Balzac began to notice something. She believed that her son is in love with the lovely Emmanuelle, who was only a few years younger Honore. But the heart of the young writer was given to Laura, her husband gave birth to nine children!

Laura de Bernis - Balzac's first love - played a big role in his life. "She was my mother, girlfriend, family, companion and sovetchitsey - he admitted later. - She made me a writer, she consoled me in my youth, she has awakened in me a taste, she wept and laughed with me, my sister, she always came me beneficent Napping, which utishaet pain . . . Without it I would simply have died. " She did everything for him that a woman can do for men. These relations for a decade, from 1822 to 1833, were sensually intimate. Just how important was it for this relationship, Balzac expressed in the immortal words: "Nothing can compare with the last love of a woman who gives men the happiness of first love. "

Laura did not immediately respond to his sense, but Young threw her Honore letters with declarations: "As you were good yesterday! Many times you were up to me in dreams, brilliant and charming, but I confess that yesterday you went around her rival - the only ruler of my Dream.

Photo — «Honore De Balzac»

" Madame de Berny gave him a warm May night. Honore blissfully happy: "Oh Laura, I am writing to you, but the silence surrounds me night night full of you, but my soul lives in the memory of your passionate kisses! What else can I think? . . I keep seeing our bench and I I feel like your dear hands tenderly embracing me, and flowers in front of me, even though they have faded, retain the heady aroma. "

Madame de Berny was full of passion and fire. But soon their relationship became known in the world. Society has condemned lovers. Meanwhile, all the publishing projects have failed Honore. Laura helped her beloved not only by word of consolation, but also financially. They remained friends until her death in 1836, and correspondence. Laura de Bernis was the inspiration heroine "Lily of the valley," although, as noted by the writer himself, "the image of Madame de Mortsauf in" Lily of the valley, "a pale reflection of the merits of this very small woman. "

Since Balzac satisfy only those women who exceeded his experience and, oddly enough, the age. He was not seduced young beauties who demanded too much and too little rewarded. "Forty-year woman will do everything for you, twenty years - nothing!"

The Duchess d? Abrantes, widow of General Junot, when Balzac met her around 1829 in Versailles, hopelessly mired in debt and did not enjoy respect in society. She traded in his memoirs. The Duchess easily stole the young writer from the clutches of an aging Laura de Bernis. On Balzac's title and the aristocratic family until the last day of his life produced an irresistible impression. Sometimes they are just fascinated by it.

Balzac was triumphant, becoming the lover of the Duchess. However, this relationship did not last long, over time their relationship became purely friendly. The Duchess launched in Balzac's salon of Madame de Recamier and the home of some of his fashionable friends. He helped her to sell his memoirs and, possibly, participated in writing them.

Around that time in the life of Balzac entered the other woman, Zulma Carro. Ugly, lame, she did not love her husband, manager of gunpowder factory, whose military career was not successful. But have respect for his noble character and deeply sympathized with him as a man, a broken failure. Meeting with Zulma Honore in a house of his sister was fortunate for both - for her and Balzac.

Balzac began to comprehend the greatness of this woman's mind, capable of amazing self-sacrifice. He wrote to her: "A quarter of an hour that I can spend the evening with you, means more to me than all the bliss of a night spent in the arms of the young beauty . . . "

But Carro Zulma knew that she had no female attractiveness that can ever bind the man that she puts above all others.

Photo — «Honore De Balzac»

And besides, she could not cheat or leave the poor husband. Zulma invited writer friendship, "the holy and good friendship. " In the letters she openly expressed on the works of Balzac. He thanked her for criticism. "You - my audience. I'm proud of familiarity with you, with you, which gives me the courage to strive for perfection. " Before his death, Honore, surveying the entire gaze past life, admitted that Zulma was the most significant, the best of his girlfriends. And he took up his pen, and after a long silence, she wrote a farewell letter . . .

Balzac showed true psychological sense, when all of the great women around him, especially close friends with the noble Marcelino Debord-Valmore, which he dedicated one of the most beautiful of his creations, and to which, out of breath climbing the steep stairs to the attic of the Palais Royal. From George Sand, whom he called "my friend George," he had a sincere friendship only, without the slightest hint of intimacy. Balzac pride would not allow him to be included in an extensive list of her lovers.

Balzac did not have time to look for a woman to seek his beloved. Fourteen, fifteen hours he worked at his desk. The rest he spent on sleep and urgent matters. But women are looking for dating with a famous writer, showering him with letters. Women's writing took him, admired, and worried. October 5, 1831, he received a letter signed by the English name. O wonder! It was the marquise. Father of the future Duchess Henriette-Marie de Castries was the Duke de Meye, a former marshal of France, whose lineage went back to the eleventh century. Her mother was the Duchess of Fitz-James, in other words, of the Stuarts, and therefore of royal blood. Marquise was thirty-five years, which is consistent with the ideal of Balzac. She survived the novel, sensational in the community. Madame de Castries in love with the almighty son of Chancellor Metternich. The feeling was mutual. Love affair ended tragically: Marquis on hunting has fallen from his horse and broke her spine and has since had to spend much time in a lounge chair or bed. Junior Metternich died of tuberculosis. Balzac decided to woo this poor woman. They met in the salon of the palace de Castellane. Three hours flew by the conversation. "You made me so kindly, - he wrote it - you have given me such a sweet watch, and I am firmly convinced that you alone my happiness!"

Relations became more cordial. Balzac crew each night stayed at the palace Castellane, and the conversation lasted well past midnight. He accompanied her to the theater, wrote her a letter, read to her his new work, he asked for her advice, she gave the most precious of all that I could give: a manuscript "Thirty women," "Colonel Chabert" and "Orders. " For single women, who for many weeks and months of mourning for the dead gave herself, this spiritual friendship meant a kind of happiness, for Balzac, it meant a passion.

Photo — «Honore De Balzac»

However, as soon as it advances closer to a dangerous point, the Duchess began to defend resolutely and firmly. For several months she let the writer "only slowly moved forward, making small gains, which must be satisfied with a shy lover," stubbornly unwilling "to confirm the fidelity of his heart, joined him and his own special". Maybe she decided to remain faithful to her husband, the father of her child, perhaps ashamed of his injury or was afraid, that Balzac talked about their relationship with an aristocrat. Alas, the writer first knew that his will is not omnipotent. However, the story of Madame de Castries was not a disaster for Balzac, and only a minor episode.

The Duchess de Castries is not the only acquaintance that Balzac must postman. There was a whole string of gentle friends, in most cases are known only by their names - Louise, Claire, Marie. Women are normally provided to Balzac's home, and one of them took out an illegitimate child. Balzac once said: "It is much easier to be a lover than a husband, for the simple reason that it is much harder to show the whole day wit and intelligence, than to say something clever but from time to time. " But do not ever break out instead of adultery true love?

In 1832 there was a small event at first glance. February 28 Balzac Gosslen publisher handed him the letter with the postmark "Odessa". The letter was from an unknown reader, a signatory, "Foreigner. " After a while of it came a second letter asking you to confirm receipt of messages from the newspaper circulated in Russia, "Quotidien", which intrigued Balzac did. He soon learned the name of his correspondent. It was a rich landowner Polish, Russian subjects Ghana Evelyn, nee Countess Rzhevusskaya. It is spoken a French, in English, German. Her husband Wenceslas Ghanaian, who was fifty, was often sick. Both missed in his castle in Volhynia, in the Supreme. Eva gave birth to her husband of seven (from other sources - five) children. But only one daughter survived. Eveline, statuesque, sensual woman who was thirty years old.

Since the beginning of 1833 between Ghana and the French novelist, began a lively correspondence, which lasted fifteen years. Each time, his message became more and more exalted. "You can bring happiness to me one, Eva. I stand before you on my knees, my heart belongs to you. Kill me with one blow, but do not make me suffer, I love you with all the forces of my soul - do not force me to part with these beautiful hopes!"

In autumn 1833 in the small Swiss town of Neuchatel was Balzac's first date with Ghana. Unfortunately, this important stage in the life of Balzac's novel did not reach us. There are different versions. For one - he allegedly saw the Ghanaian, when he stood at the window, "Villa Andre," and was shocked by how much its appearance coincided with the appearance, who saw in his prophetic dreams, on the other - she immediately recognized him for his portraits and approached him.

Photo — «Honore De Balzac»

On the third - could not hide her disappointment as her appearance troubadour. Balzac had met with Ghanaian family. Her head was delighted with dating a famous writer. Honore and Evelyn almost could not be alone. Yet Balzac returned to Paris inspired. Stranger was perfection itself! He loved all of it: her sharp foreign accent, his mouth, testifying to the kindness and sensuality. He came in trembling, he was frightened when he saw that his whole life belongs to her: "Throughout the world there is no other woman, but you're the only one!"

In 1833, Honore has worked on several novels. Balzac is increasingly returning to the idea, he still emerged in 1831, while working on the "shagreen skin" - to unite in one great novel cycle. In the early thirties emerged that hectic, stressful pace of work, which became characteristic of Balzac, for many years. He wrote, usually at night, with curtains tightly closed and light the candles. Quick, jerky hand use up page after page, barely able to keep pace with the rapid run of his imagination and thought, and so ten, twelve, fourteen, and sometimes sixteen, eighteen hours a day. So day after day, month after month, supporting the forces of a huge number of black coffee. Then he allowed himself to relax with friends and lovers. He admitted to Ghana: "For three years I lived chastely, as a young girl," though on the eve of her sister proudly announced that the father of an illegitimate child.

Balzac continued to throw Stranger from the Supreme letters. "How do you want me you did not like - you are the first, which was the distance to warm hearts, languishing for love, I did everything possible to attract the attention of the heavenly angel, my fame was a beacon - no more. And then you figured out all: the soul, heart, man. Even last night, reading your letter, I made sure that only you can understand one my whole life. You ask me how I find time to write you! Well, my dear Eve (let me cut your name, so it is better you can prove that you represent for me all the feminine - the only woman in the world, you fill the whole world to me, like Eve to the first man). Well, you - the only one asked the poor artist, who never have enough time, not if he sacrifices something great, thinking and speaking to his lover? no one around me does not think about it, all would have no hesitation would deprive all of my time. And now I would like to dedicate my life to you