Balzac

Balzac by Frederick Wedmore (1890)

Frederick Wedmore opens by noting that recent publication, in the Revue de Paris, of a series of Balzac's letters confirms the view that Balzac, by temperament and inclination as well as by power, is divided from the sordid and limited realists at whose head fashion once placed him: Romance was claimed for Victor Hugo, Materialism for Balzac, yet Balzac in mature years proves more simply and absolutely romantic than the most visionary schoolgirl. He works himself into an enthusiastic, respectful attachment to a young married woman he has never seen, who inquires about his stories, sends him Thomas à Kempis (which he later translates into the Médecin de Campagne), corresponds with him confidentially for a year or two before meeting him, later receives him as her guest in Russian Poland, and whom he marries at last, in 1850, several years after her husband's death. The facts last mentioned have been known since the publication of Balzac's Correspondence. The new material concerns the earlier part of the story. It had been reported that Balzac first learned of Madame de Hanska's existence while staying at Neuchâtel in September 1833, and that she asked to be introduced to him on hearing he was at the hotel. Wedmore establishes, with the present proprietor of the Hôtel Belle Vue at Neuchâtel, that the old Hôtel du Faucon, built shortly before Balzac's visit, must have been the hostelry where the meeting took place, since neither the Belle Vue nor the Lac existed then. They met at the Faucon, after a correspondence by turns polite and chivalrous, intimate and ardent. It was not unusual for Balzac to receive confessions from women admirers. In the published Correspondence it is chiefly a question of an anonymous "Louise," whom he never saw, to whom he wrote pretty things and once meant to dedicate a story, and whose letters he generally left unanswered. But with Evelina de Hanska there was intimate correspondence before any meeting, creating a tie not easily broken. Balzac was in a wounded, sore state during this early correspondence. Two other attachments were then in crisis. Madame de Berny, older than Balzac, had helped him through money troubles and worldly inexperience; at her house in the Oise he wrote Le Curé de Tours, and her qualities informed Le Lys dans la Vallée. Their relationship ended only with her death; her mortal illness began about 1833. During 1832 Balzac also passed through what he later called one of the greatest griefs of his life, his experience with Madame de Castries, later Duchesse de Castries. Letters to his friend Madame Zulma Carraud of Angoulême reveal the effect: delight, then disillusionment, then a painful, attractive memory. The rupture occurred at Geneva in autumn 1832, when Balzac, meant to travel to Italy with her and her brother, parted from her there and consoled himself by buying Carl Théodore (Frankenthal) porcelain on the Quai des Bergues. The second published letter to Madame de Hanska contains sentences seemingly referring to Madame de Castries, about a heart full of repressed tears still sufficing for the labor of writing, and about all his passions and beliefs being betrayed. He tells his correspondent that Madame Récamier never sat for Feodora in Peau de Chagrin; he made Feodora from two women he knew, aided by a few confidences. What struck Balzac in Evelina de Hanska was her sincerity, her devotion to his work, and a sympathy between their natures. He writes that there are books in which he loved to be himself, those in which his heart spoke. When the two met at Neuchâtel in 1833, and later in Vienna and in Russian Poland, nothing diminished the interest or broke the spell. Wedmore suggests her sympathy and participation in his work, including Séraphita, gave the attachment features of consolation: his early passion was for Madame de Berny, his maturer ideal was Madame de Castries, but in Evelina de Hanska he found steady rest, deeper even than the devotion of his lifelong friend Madame Zulma Carraud. Wedmore concludes that Balzac was an idealist from beginning to end, seeking intimacy of the heart rather than superficial attachments, and that those who call him merely materialist or realist misjudge the depths of feeling and poetry in him, depths the mere disciples of literary ugliness who claim him as master can never approach.

By Frederick Wedmore · First published 1890 · Genre: Literary Criticism, Biography, Essay · 2,658 words

First lines

Through the ‘usual channels of information' -- I mean, of course, the daily papers -- many readers have become aware of the recent publication, in the _Revue de Paris_, of a series of Balzac's letters. But few have understood their importance. Their interest for the student is great, for in a revelation of their author, that is impressive and almost final, they confirm to the full the view of Balzac which those of us have taken (I took it myself in my little _Life_ of him in the ‘Great Writers' Series) who have perceived that by his temperament and inclination, as well as by his power, he is divided widely from those more sordid and limited realists at whose head it was erewhile the fashion to place him. Romance, it has been claimed -- often by friend and foe alike -- Romance was Victor Hugo's, Materialism was Balzac's. And now Balzac is found -- and one has a right to be surprised, not of course at the kind, but only at the degree of the manifestation -- he is found in mature years to be in his own conduct more simply and absolutely romantic than the most visionary or most warm-hearted schoolgirl. He works himself into a genuine and indescribably enthusiastic, but always respectful, attachment to a young married woman whom he has never seen, who inquires of him about his stories, who sends him _Thomas à Kempis_ (which he translates later into the _Médecin de Campagne_: ‘c'est l'Evangile en action'), who writes to him confidentially for a year or two before she meets him, who later receives him as her guest in Russian Poland, and whom he marries at last, in 1850, only several years after the death of her husband.

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biography · correspondence · letters · idealism · romance · women and literature · love · marriage · literary criticism · literary reputation · realism · materialism

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