The Cambridge Companion to Balzac by Owen Heathcote, Andrew W... - 9781107691285

Cambridge University Press

The Cambridge Companion to BalzacAuthor(s): Owen Heathcote, Andrew Watts\nFormat: Paperback\nPublisher: Cambridge University Press, United Kingdom\nImprint: Cambridge University Press\nISBN-13: 9781107691285, 978-1107691285\nSynopsis\nOne of the founders of literary realism and the serial novel, Honor de Balzac [tel] was a prolific writer who produced more than a hundred novels, plays and short stories during his career. With its dramatic plots and memorable characters, Balzac's fiction has enthralled generations of readers. 'La Comdie humaine', the vast collection of works in which he strove to document every aspect of nineteenth-century French society, has influenced writers from Flaubert, Zola and Proust to Dostoevsky and Oscar Wilde. This Companion provides a critical reappraisal of Balzac, combining studies of his major novels with guidance on the key narrative and thematic features of his writing. Twelve chapters by world-leading specialists encompass a wide spectrum of topics .