“The idea of The Human Comedy . . . originated in a comparison between Humanity and Animality.”
A painter’s greatest masterpiece is inspired by a young girl of angelic beauty, but their resulting marriage only serves to reveal the deep divide between their true natures . . . A haughty young demoiselle, the last child to marry from an old noble family, is raised to be all too discerning in her choice of a future husband, with tragic consequences . . . A lifelong correspondence between two young women illustrates their different ideas about love and marriage―one valuing romance and excitement, the other marital duty―but as they begin to live out their philosophies of love and life, one thrives as a wife and mother while the other is slowly consumed by jealousy . . .
The works in this volume―At the Sign of The Cat &amp; Racket, The Ball at Sceaux, and Letters of Two Brides―are preceded by an introduction in which the author sets forth the history of the project and explains his principles of composition
La Comédie Humaine, left unfinished at the time of Balzac’s death, is a vast literary work comprising nearly one hundred short stories, novellas, and novels set in the aftermath of the Napoleonic Wars during the Bourbon Restoration and the July Monarchy. Throughout, Balzac utilizes nineteenth-century French society to examine humanity and the human experience with all its attendant virtues, vices, and peculiarities.
Honoré de Balzac (1799-1850) was one of France’s most prolific and influential writers, and is generally considered to be one of the first and greatest of the literary realists. In his lifetime, he tried and failed at a number of professions, including that of legal clerk, printer, publisher, and as a businessman who engaged in a number of abortive ventures. These experiences, as well as numerous affairs with admiring ladies―many of them from the nobility―and an unsuccessful run for public office, provided him with a wealth of material for his writing, in which he was able to create some of the most memorable characters in French literature.

The Human Comedy, Vol. I: At the Sign of The Cat & Racket and Other Works (Noumena Classics)

Literature & Fiction

BALZAC, Honoré de

Literary

Noumena Press

“How insignificant seem the influences of the sensible things which are tossed and fall and lie about us in the environment of early childhood. How indelibly, as we afterwards discover, they affect us, giving form and feature to early experiences of feeling and thought, which abide with us ever afterwards . . .” In an idealized memory of childhood, a young boy’s awareness of the world around him blossoms―an awareness of beauty and wonder, but also of death . . . The meeting of a mysterious stranger and a fanciful young woman results in the auspicious birth of a child with the soul of a poet . . . A submissive youth from a venerable family goes off to school and befriends a kindred spirit, but when war breaks out the two make a fateful decision that will forever change the course of their lives . . . Walter Horatio Pater (1839-1894) was an English essayist, art critic, and academic best remembered for his Studies in the History of the Renaissance (1873), a book at the forefront of the Aesthetic Movement, which considered a successful life to “burn always with this hard, gemlike flame.” Pater also wrote a series of what he termed “Imaginary Portraits:” a type of literary vignette of his own devising that masterfully blended elements of biography, prose poem, and short story. While most of the Portraits take the form of historical recreations, the three collected in this edition are more contemporary to Pater’s own time and are perhaps the most autobiographical. Previously appearing in the posthumous Miscellaneous Studies (1895), “The Child in the House” and “Emerald Uthwart” are better served thematically in a separate volume. They are reprinted here along with a fragment entitled “An English Poet,” a nearly forgotten Imaginary Portrait which appears in book form for the first time. With regard to its influence, there is strong evidence to suggest that “The Child in the House” was a major―or quite possibly even indispensable―inspiration for Proust in his writing of In Search of Lost Time.

The Child in the House and Other Imaginary Portraits (Noumena Classics)

Pater, Walter

“The innocence of a girl is like milk which is turned by a thunder-clap, by an evil smell, by a hot day, or even by a breath.”The chance meeting of a renowned painter and a mysterious girl blossoms into love, but when their ensuing courtship is marred by the disappearance of a purse full of money, their newfound happiness threatens to unravel . . . To the north of Paris in the port city of Le Havre, a drama of love and deception unfolds when the last and fiercely guarded daughter of a once prosperous family falls in love with the verses of a famous poet―but is this great man of letters with whom she enters into an impassioned correspondence really the person she believes him to be?The theme of reality versus illusion, particularly in matters of love, dominates the two works of this second volume of Balzac’s magnum opus.La Comédie Humaine, left unfinished at the time of Balzac’s death, is a vast literary work comprising nearly one hundred short stories, novellas, and novels set in the aftermath of the Napoleonic Wars during the Bourbon Restoration and the July Monarchy. Throughout, Balzac utilizes nineteenth-century French society to examine humanity and the human experience with all its attendant virtues, vices, and peculiarities.Honoré de Balzac (1799-1850) was one of France’s most prolific and influential writers, and is generally considered to be one of the first and greatest of the literary realists. In his lifetime, he tried and failed at a number of professions, including that of legal clerk, printer, publisher, and as a businessman who engaged in a number of abortive ventures. These experiences, as well as numerous affairs with admiring ladies―many of them from the nobility―and an unsuccessful run for public office, provided him with a wealth of material for his writing, in which he was able to create some of the most memorable characters in French literature.

The Human Comedy, Vol. II: The Purse and Modeste Mignon (Noumena Classics)

“I have seen a valley suffused with mellow light beneath a lovely veil of morning mist . . . I have seen it change and tarnish; the devouring orb passed over it, scorching and exhausting it with its glare, and leaving it burnt up, sapless, and pitifully barren. So the happy veil of our days is slowly lifted and dispersed . . . ”
Obermann, first published in 1804, is the best known work of French writer Étienne Pivert de Senancour. Usually described as an epistolary novel, the letters that constitute this volume are much closer to being a series of interlinked essays. Supposedly written by the melancholy recluse Obermann, whom critics have generally seen as a thinly disguised stand-in for Senancour himself, the letters contain the emotional outpourings of a man forever searching the depths of his innermost self in the hopes of overcoming his despair and finding a place for himself in the world, yet never quite succeeding. The letters cover a multitude of topics such as the hypocritical morals of the time, the failings of religion, the poor treatment of women in society, and the futility of existence. But while these writings are always overshadowed by an inescapable sense of brooding and pessimism, there are also passages that contain striking descriptions of Obermann’s Alpine refuge that are almost mystical in their sense of union with nature. The work is similar in some respects to Rousseau’s Reveries of the Solitary Walker, his Confessions, the Essays of Montaigne, and even to Thoreau’s Walden, yet it is wholly original in its form, and there is nothing else quite like it in the history of French literature. Though virtually unknown in America and largely forgotten in France, Obermann should nonetheless be seen as an essential text of early Romanticism whose rightful place is next to Goethe’s Sorrows of Young Werther and Chateaubriand’s René.
Étienne Pivert de Senancour (1770-1846) as a French essayist who spent most of his life in obscurity, surviving primarily by his pen. He finally attained some notice in 1827 after he was accused of slandering religion in the second edition of his Résumé de l’histoire des traditions morales et religieuses. The successful defense of his case and the resulting publicity saw reissues of his earlier works including Obermann, De l’Amour (1806), and Libres Méditations d’un solitaire inconnu (1819).

Obermann (Noumena Classics)

Senancour, Étienne Pivert de

“To the shame of the young be it said, good advice and warnings are never to seek.”
On a coach ride between towns, a callow young man gets caught up in a round of tale-telling with his fellow passengers and ends up committing an indiscretion that will take a lifetime to undo . . . In the town of Besançon, a cloistered young girl reads a romance penned by a mysterious newcomer and schemes to take the place of the story’s real-life inspiration: a beautiful Italian duchess . . . Two lovers stand in defiance of the age-old feud that has decimated their families: a vendetta that even Napoléon Bonaparte himself may be powerless to stop . . .
Beginning again in life, whether in one’s profession, or, to a lesser extent, for the purpose of concealing one’s identity, is the theme that unifies the three stories―A Start in Life, Albert Savarus, and The Vendetta―that appear in this volume of The Human Comedy.
La Comédie Humaine, left unfinished at the time of Balzac’s death, is a vast literary work comprising nearly one hundred short stories, novellas, and novels set in the aftermath of the Napoleonic Wars during the Bourbon Restoration and the July Monarchy. Throughout, Balzac utilizes nineteenth century French society to examine humanity and the human experience with all its attendant virtues, vices, and peculiarities.
Honoré de Balzac (1799-1850) was one of France’s most prolific and influential writers, and is generally considered to be one of the first and greatest of the literary realists. In his lifetime, he tried and failed at a number of professions, including that of legal clerk, printer, publisher, and as a businessman who engaged in a number of abortive ventures. These experiences, as well as numerous affairs with admiring ladies―many of them from the nobility―and an unsuccessful run for public office, provided him with a wealth of material for his writing, in which he was able to create some of the most memorable characters in French literature.

The Human Comedy, Vol. III: A Start in Life and Other Works (Noumena Classics)

"...the duty of a woman, who wishes for domestic peace, compels her to bury sufferings so keen as hers at the bottom of her heart, and without a complaint." Day after day, a poor but beautiful young seamstress toils away by her window, waiting for the mysterious Monsieur Noir: a gentleman she hopes will be the answer to all her prayers . . . A ball given at the height of Napoléon's power is the scene of a wager between army comrades to see who will be the first to dance with an unknown lady in blue . . . Who is Madame Firmiani? Is she a beautiful society lady? A dangerous woman, a siren? Or is she perhaps nothing more than an innocent and charming hostess who gives delightful tea parties? The rich uncle of a young man who has come under her sway is determined to find out . . . A Second Home, Domestic Peace, Madame Firmiani, A Study of Woman, The Imaginary Mistress, and A Daughter of Eve are the six works of The Human Comedy presented in this volume, all of which share adultery and suspicion as their primary themes.
La Comédie Humaine, left unfinished at the time of Balzac’s death, is a vast literary work comprising nearly one hundred short stories, novellas, and novels set in the aftermath of the Napoleonic Wars during the Bourbon Restoration and the July Monarchy. Throughout, Balzac utilizes nineteenth century French society to examine humanity and the human experience with all its attendant virtues, vices, and peculiarities.
Honoré de Balzac (1799-1850) was one of France’s most prolific and influential writers, and is generally considered to be one of the first and greatest of the literary realists. In his lifetime, he tried and failed at a number of professions, including that of legal clerk, printer, publisher, and as a businessman who engaged in a number of abortive ventures. These experiences, as well as numerous affairs with admiring ladies―many of them from the nobility―and an unsuccessful run for public office, provided him with a wealth of material for his writing, in which he was able to create some of the most memorable characters in French literature.

The Human Comedy, Vol. IV: A Second Home and Other Works (Noumena Classics)

Fiction. Translated by Robert A. Cantrick. Rome, 2011. A German archaeologist and part-time tour guide accidentally stumbles upon the pope attending a Protestant church incognito and enters into a whirlwind of speculation: What does the pope's hand do when he's doing nothing? What might make his hand twitch? Is there such a thing as a papal slap, and if so to whom should it be administered? To the lecherous Italian Prime Minister? To a certain Libyan oil dictator as he curries favor with the Italian head of state with thirty Berber horses while at the same time attempting to convert all of Europe to Islam? And speaking of which, why did Saint Augustine have to bribe the Roman Emperor Honorius with eighty Numidian stallions to gain acceptance for the doctrine of original sin? Why do Germans long for Rome, even though--ever since the Teutonic invasions and the Nazi occupation--they have been considered the worst sort of barbarians there? Meanwhile, the narrator's sister-in-law dreams of being pope, the pizza breath of noisy tourists wafts through the Sistine Chapel, and rats swarm about Via Veneto. Looking past the idealized Rome of picture postcards, the tour guide mentally roams through the city's long history and extols the Italian art of saying yes and no at the same time. At once a timeless tale of Rome and the birth of a modern legend: how the pope became a Lutheran. "A wonderful story...here a free spirit vents his feelings on the oppressive perfume of the Roman historical superpower."--Süddeutsche Zeitung "A slender, intelligent book...satirical and written with literary finesse."--Westdeutscher Rundfunk "Besides the Baedeker, this book belongs in the luggage of every visitor to Rome."--Deutschlandfunk

The Pope's Left Hand

Delius, Friedrich Christian

Robert A Cantrick (Translator)

Humor & Satire

About the Author\nMeral Kureyshi was born in 1983 in Prizren in the former Yugoslavia, where her family belonged to the Turkish-speaking minority. She immigrated to Switzerland with her family in 1992 and now lives in Bern. She has studied German literature at the Swiss Literature Institute in Biel, founded a poetry workshop for children, and now works as a freelance writer. Her first novel, Elephants in Our Yard, was nominated for the Swiss Book Prize in 2015, won several awards, and has been translated into many languages. Her second novel, Funf Jahrezeiten, was published in 2020, and was awarded Das zweite Buch prize by the Marianne and Curt Dienemann Foundation.\nShortlisted for the 2015 Swiss Book Prize 
When her father dies unexpectedly, the young narrator of ELEPHANTS IN OUR YARD finds her life thrown into disarray. As a member of a Turkish Kosovar family now living in Switzerland, she feels unwelcome in her adopted homeland and struggles to fit in and make connections with others. Aimless and adrift, she spends a year living in a state of uncertainty, fitfully attending lectures at the university, taking long train rides, and returning to places from her previous life in Prizren. Memories of her idyllic childhood in this old Ottoman city, from which she emigrated with her family at the age of ten, force their way into the present. But the world of her childhood no longer exists, and she realizes that she, too, has changed. As she tries to find a place for herself in her new country and becomes fluent in her adopted language, she becomes increasingly more estranged from her mother with every new word of German she speaks. ELEPHANTS IN OUR YARD is a poignant first novel about a life marked by migration and alienation, sadness and loss, but also by hope and new beginnings. 
Fiction.\nBook Description\nShortlisted for the 2015 Swiss Book Prize

Elephants in Our Yard

Kureyshi, Meral

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