Produced by John Bickers and Dagny Wilson
First published 1904.
HONORE DE BALZAC
HIS LIFE AND WRITINGS
BY
MARY F. SANDARS
PREFACE
Books about Balzac would fill a fair-sized library. Criticisms on his
novels abound, and his contemporaries have provided us with several
amusing volumes dealing in a humorous spirit with his eccentricities,
and conveying the impression that the author of "La Cousine Bette" and
"Le Pere Goriot" was nothing more than an amiable buffoon.
Nevertheless, by some strange anomaly, there exists no Life of him
derived from original sources, incorporating the information available
since the appearance of the volume called "Lettres a l'Etrangere."
This book, which is the source of much of our present knowledge of
Balzac, is a collection of letters written by him from 1833 to 1844 to
Madame Hanska, the Polish lady who afterwards became his wife. The
letters are exact copies of the originals, having been made by the
Vicomte de Spoelberch de Lovenjoul, to whom the autographs belong.
It seems curious that no one should yet have made use of this mine of
biographical detail. In English we have a Memoir by Miss Wormeley,
written at a time when little as known about the great novelist, and a
Life by Mr. Frederick Wedmore in the "Great Writers" Series; but this,
like Miss Wormeley's Memoir, appeared before the "Lettres a
l'Etrangere" were published. Moreover, it is a very small book, and
the space in it devoted to Balzac as a man is further curtailed by
several chapters devoted to criticism of his work. The introduction to
the excellent translation of Balzac's novels undertaken by Mr.
Saintsbury, contains a short account of his life, but this only fills
a few pages and does not enter into much detail. Besides these, an
admirable essay on Balzac has appeared in "Main Currents of
Nineteenth-century Literature," by Mr. George Brandes; the scope of
this, however, is mainly criticism of his merits as a writer, not
description of his personality and doings.
Even in the French language, there is no trustworthy or satisfactory
Life of Balzac--a fact on which numerous critical writers make many
comments, though they apparently hesitate to throw themselves into the
breach and to undertake one. Madame Surville's charming Memoir only
professes to treat of Balzac's early life, and even within these
limits she intentionally conceals as much as she reveals. M. Edmond
Bire, in his interesting book, presents Balzac in different aspects,
as Royalist, playwriter, admirer of Napoleon, and so on; but M. Bire
gives no connected account of his life, while MM. Hanotaux and Vicaire
deal solely with Balzac's two years as printer and publisher. The
Vicomte de Spoelberch de Lovenjoul is the one man who could give a
detailed and minutely correct Life of Balzac, as he has proved by the
stores of biographical knowledge contained in his works the "Roman
d'Amour," "Autour de Honore de Balzac," "La Genese d'un Roman de
Balzac, 'Les Paysans,'" and above all, "L'Histoire des Oeuvres de
Balzac," which has become a classic. The English or American reader
would hardly be able to appreciate these fascinating books, however,
unless he were first equipped with the knowledge of Balzac which would
be provided by a concise Life.
In these circumstances, helped and encouraged by Dr. Emil Reich, whose
extremely interesting lectures I had attended with much enjoyment, and
who very kindly gave me lists of books, and assisted me with advice, I
engaged in the task of writing this book. It is not intended to add to
the mass of criticism of Balzac's novels, being merely an attempt to
portray the man as he was, and to sketch correctly a career which has
been said to be more thrilling than a large proportion of novels.
I must apologise for occasional blank spaces, for when Balzac is with
Madame Hanska, and his letters to her cease, as a general rule all our
information ceases also; and the intending biographer can only glean
from scanty allusions in the letters written afterwards, what happened
at Rome, Naples, Dresden, or any of the other towns, to which Balzac
travelled in hot haste to meet his divinity.
The book has been compiled as far as possible from original sources;
as the Vicomte de Spoelberch de Lovenjoul--whose collection of
documents relating to Balzac, Gautier, and George Sand is unique,
while his comprehensive knowledge of Balzac is the result of many
years of study--has most kindly allowed me to avail myself of his
library at Brussels. There, arranged methodically, according to some
wonderful system which enables the Vicomte to find at once any
document his visitor may ask for, are hundreds of Balzac's autograph
writings, many of them unpublished and of great interest. There, too,
are portraits and busts of the celebrated novelist, letters from his
numerous admirers, and the proofs of nearly all his novels--those
sheets covered with a network of writing, which were the despair of
the printers. The collection is most remarkable, even when we remember
the large sums of money, and the patience and ability, which have for
many years been focussed on its formation. It will one day be
deposited in the museum at Chantilly, near Paris, where it will be at
the disposal of those who wish to study its contents.
The Vicomte has kindly devoted much time to answering my questions,
and has shown me documents and autograph letters, the exact words of
which have been the subject of discussion and dispute, so that I have
been able myself to verify the fact that the copies made by M. de
Spoelberch de Lovenjoul are taken exactly from the originals. He has
warned me to be particularly careful about my authorities, as many of
Balzac's letters--printed as though copied from autographs--are
incorrectly dated, and have been much altered.
He has further added to his kindness by giving me several
illustrations, and by having this book translated to him, in order to
correct it carefully by the information to which he alone has access.
I gladly take this opportunity of acknowledging how deeply I am
indebted to him.
I cannot consider these words of introduction complete without again
expressing my sense of what I owe to Dr. Reich, to whom the initial
idea of this book is due, and without whose energetic impetus it would
never have been written. He has found time, in the midst of a very
busy life, to read through, and to make many valuable suggestions, and
I am most grateful for all he has done to help me.
I must finish by thanking Mr. Curtis Brown most heartily for the
trouble he has taken on my behalf, for the useful hints he has given
me, and for the patience with which he has elucidated the difficulties
of an inexperienced writer.
MARY F. SANDARS.
HONORE DE BALZAC
CHAPTER I
Balzac's claims to greatness--The difficulty in attempting a
complete Life--His complex character--The intention of this book.
At a time when the so-called Realistic School is in the ascendant
among novelists, it seems strange that little authentic information
should have been published in the English language about the great
French writer, Honore de Balzac. Almost alone among his
contemporaries, he dared to claim the interest of the world for
ordinary men and women solely on the ground of a common humanity. Thus
he was the first to embody in literature the principle of Burns that
"a man's a man for a' that"; and though this fact has now become a
truism, it was a discovery, and an important discovery, when Balzac
wrote. He showed that, because we are ourselves ordinary men and
women, it is really human interest, and not sensational circumstance
which appeals to us, and that material for enthralling drama can be
found in the life of the most commonplace person--of a middle-aged
shopkeeper threatened with bankruptcy, or of an elderly musician with
a weakness for good dinners. At one blow he destroyed the unreal ideal
of the Romantic School, who degraded man by setting up in his place a
fantastic and impossible hero as the only theme worthy of their pen;
and thus he laid the foundation of the modern novel.
His own life is full of interest. He was not a recluse or a bookworm;
his work was to study men, and he lived among men, he fought
strenuously, he enjoyed lustily, he suffered keenly, and he died
prematurely, worn out by the force of his own emotions, and by the
prodigies of labour to which he was impelled by the restless
promptings of his active brain, and by his ever-pressing need for
money. Some of his letters to Madame Hanska have been published during
the last few years; and where can we read a more pathetic love story
than the record of his seventeen years' waiting for her, and of the
tragic ending to his long-deferred happiness? Or where in modern times
can more exciting and often comical tales of adventure be found than
the accounts of his wild and always unsuccessful attempts to become a
millionaire? His friends comprised most of the celebrated French
writers of the day; and though not a lover of society, he was
acquainted with many varieties of people, while his own personality
was powerful, vivid, and eccentric.
Thus he appears at first sight to be a fascinating subject for
biography; but if we examine a little more closely, we shall realise
the web of difficulties in which the writer of a complete and
exhaustive Life of Balzac would involve himself, and shall understand
why the task has never been attempted. The great author's money
affairs alone are so complicated that it is doubtful whether he ever
mastered them himself, and it is certainly impossible for any one else
to understand them; while he managed to shroud his private life,
especially his relations to women, in almost complete mystery. For
some years after his death the monkish habit in which he attired
himself was considered symbolic of his mental attitude; and even now,
though the veil is partially lifted, and we realise the great part
women played in his life, there remain many points which are not yet
cleared up.
Consequently any one who attempts even in the most unambitious way to
give a complete account of the great writer's life, is confronted with
many blank spaces. It is true that the absolutely mysterious
disappearances of which his contemporaries speak curiously are now
partially accounted for, as we know that they were usually connected
with Madame Hanska, and that Balzac's sense of honour would not allow
him to breathe her name, except to his most intimate friends, and
under the pledge of the strictest secrecy. His letters to her have
allowed a flood of light to pour upon his hitherto veiled personality;
but they are almost our only reliable source of information.
Therefore, when they cease, because Balzac is with his ladylove, and
we are suddenly excluded from his confidence, we can only guess what
is happening.
In this way, we possess but the scantiest information about the
journeys which occupied a great part of his time during the last few
years of his life. We know that he travelled, regardless of expense
and exhaustion, as quickly as possible, and by the very shortest
route, to meet Madame Hanska; but this once accomplished, we can
gather little more, and we long for a diary or a confidential
correspondent. In the first rapture of his meeting at Neufchatel, he
did indeed open his heart to his sister, Madame Surville; but his
habitual discretion, and his care for the reputation of the woman he
loved, soon imposed silence upon him, and he ceased to comment on the
great drama of his life.
The great versatility of his mind, and the power he possessed of
throwing himself with the utmost keenness into many absolutely
dissimilar and incongruous enterprises at the same time, add further
to the difficulty of understanding him. An extraordinary number of
subjects had their place in his capacious brain, and the ease with
which he dismissed one and took up another with equal zest the moment
after, causes his doings to seem unnatural to us of ordinary mind.
Leon Gozlan gives a curious instance of this on the occasion of the
first reading of the "Ressources de Quinola."
Balzac had recited his play in the green-room of the Odeon to the
assembled actors and actresses, and before a most critical audience
had gone through the terrible strain of trying to improvise the fifth
act, which was not yet written. He and Gozlan went straight from the
hot atmosphere of the theatre to refresh themselves in the cool air of
the Luxembourg Gardens. Here we should expect one of two things to
happen. Either Balzac would be depressed with the ill-success of his
fifth act, at which, according to Gozlan, he had acquitted himself so
badly that Madame Dorval, the principal actress, refused to take a
role in the play; or, on the other hand, his sanguine temperament
would cause him to overlook the drawbacks, and to think only of the
enthusiasm with which the first four acts had been received. Neither
of these two things took place. Balzac "n'y pensait deja plus." He
talked with the greatest eagerness of the embellishments he had
proposed to M. Decazes for his palace, and especially of a grand
spiral staircase, which was to lead from the centre of the Luxembourg
Gardens to the Catacombs, so that these might be shown to visitors,
and become a source of profit to Paris. But of his play he said
nothing.
The reader of "Lettres a l'Etrangere," which are written to the woman
with whom Balzac was passionately in love, and whom he afterwards
married, may, perhaps, at first sight congratulate himself on at last
understanding in some degree the great author's character and mode of
life. If he dives beneath the surface, however, he will find that
these beautiful and touching letters give but an incomplete picture;
and that, while writing them, Balzac was throwing much energy into
schemes, which he either does not mention to his correspondent, or
touches on in the most cursory fashion. Therefore the perspective of
his life is difficult to arrange, and ordinary rules for gauging
character are at fault. We find it impossible to follow the principle,
that because Balzac possessed one characteristic, he could not also
show a diametrically opposite quality--that, for instance, because
tenderness, delicacy of feeling, and a high sense of reverence and of
honour were undoubtedly integral parts of his personality, the stories
told by his contemporaries of his occasional coarseness must
necessarily be false.
His own words, written to the Duchesse d'Abrantes in 1828, have no
doubt a great element of truth in them: "I have the most singular
character I know. I study myself as I might study another person, and
I possess, shut up in my five foot eight inches, all the incoherences,
all the contrasts possible; and those who think me vain, extravagant,
obstinate, high-minded, without connection in my ideas,--a fop,
negligent, idle, without application, without reflection, without any
constancy; a chatterbox, without tact, badly brought up, impolite,
whimsical, unequal in temper,--are quite as right as those who perhaps
say that I am economical, modest, courageous, stingy, energetic, a
worker, constant, silent, full of delicacy, polite, always gay. Those
who consider that I am a coward will not be more wrong than those who
say that I am extremely brave; in short, learned or ignorant, full of
talent or absurd, nothing astonishes me more than myself. I end by
believing that I am only an instrument played on by circumstances.
Does this kaleidoscope exist, because, in the soul of those who claim
to paint all the affections of the human heart, chance throws all
these affections themselves, so that they may be able, by the force of
their imagination, to feel what they paint? And is observation a sort
of memory suited to aid this lively imagination? I begin to think
so."[*]
[*] "Correspondance," vol. i. p. 77.
Certainly Balzac's character proves to the hilt the truth of the rule
that, with few exceptions in the world's history, the higher the
development, the more complex the organisation and the more violent
the clashing of the divers elements of the man's nature; so that his
soul resembles a field of battle, and he wears out quickly.
Nevertheless, because everything in Balzac seems contradictory, when
he is likened by one of his friends to the sea, which is one and
indivisible, we perceive that the comparison is not inapt. Round the
edge are the ever-restless waves; on the surface the foam blown by
fitful gusts of wind, the translucent play of sunbeams, and the
clamour of storms lashing up the billows; but down in the sombre
depths broods the resistless, immovable force which tinges with its
reflection the dancing and play above, and is the genius and
fascination, the mystery and tragedy of the sea.
Below the merriment and herculean jollity, so little represented in
his books, there was deep, gloomy force in the soul of the man who,
gifted with an almost unparalleled imagination, would yet grip the
realities of the pathetic and terrible situations he evolved with
brutal strength and insistence. The mind of the writer of "Le Pere
Goriot," "La Cousine Bette," and "Le Cousin Pons," those terrible
tragedies where the Greek god Fate marches on his victims
relentlessly, and there is no staying of the hand for pity, could not
have been merely a wide, sunny expanse with no dark places.
Nevertheless, we are again puzzled, when we attempt to realise the
personality of a man whose imagination could soar to the mystical and
philosophical conception of "Seraphita," which is full of religious
poetry, and who yet had the power in "Cesar Birotteau" to invest
prosaic and even sordid details with absolute verisimilitude, or in
the "Contes Drolatiques" would write, in Old French, stories of
Rabelaisian breadth and humour. The only solution of these
contradictions is that, partly perhaps by reason of great physical
strength, certainly because of an abnormally powerful brain and
imagination, Balzac's thoughts, feelings, and passions were unusually
strong, and were endowed with peculiar impetus and independence of
each other; and from this resulted a versatility which caused most
unexpected developments, and which fills us of smaller mould with
astonishment.
Nevertheless, steadfastness was decidedly the groundwork of the
character of the man who was not dismayed by the colossal task of the
Comedie Humaine; but pursued his work through discouragement, ill
health, and anxieties. Except near the end of his life, when, owing to
the unreasonable strain to which it had been subjected, his powerful
organism had begun to fail, Balzac refused to neglect his vocation
even for his love affairs--a self-control which must have been a
severe test to one of his temperament.
This absorption in his work cannot have been very flattering to the
ladies he admired; and one plausible explanation of Madame de
Castries' coldness to his suit is that she did not believe in the
devotion of a lover who, while paying her the most assiduous court at
Aix, would yet write from five in the morning till half-past five in
the evening, and only bestow his company on her from six till an early
bedtime. Even the adored Madame Hanska had to take second place where
work was concerned. When they were both at Vienna in 1835, he writes
with some irritation, apparently in answer to a remonstrance on her
part, that he cannot work when he knows he has to go out; and that,
owing to the time he spent the evening before in her society, he must
now shut himself up for fourteen hours and toil at "Le Lys dans la
Vallee." He adds, with his customary force of language, that if he
does not finish the book at Vienna, he will throw himself into the
Danube!
The great psychologist knew his own character well when, in another
letter to Madame Hanska, who has complained of his frivolity, he
cries, indignantly: "Frivolity of character! Why, you speak as a good
_bourgeois_ would have done, who, seeing Napoleon turn to the right,
to the left, and on all sides to examine his field of battle, would
have said, 'This man cannot remain in one place; he has no fixed
idea!'"[*]
[*] "Lettres a l'Etrangere."
This change of posture, though consonant, as Balzac says, with real
stability, is a source of bewilderment to the reader of his sayings
and doings, till it dawns upon him that, through pride, policy, and
the usual shrinking of the sensitive from casting their pearls before
swine, Balzac was a confirmed _poseur_, so that what he tells us is
often more misleading than his silence. Leon Gozlan's books are a
striking instance of the fact that, with all Balzac's jollity, his
camaraderie, and his flow of words, he did not readily reveal himself,
except to those whom he could thoroughly trust to understand him.
Gozlan went about with Balzac very often, and was specially chosen by
him time after time as a companion; but he really knew very little of
the great man. If we compare his account of Balzac's feeling or want
of feeling at a certain crisis, and then read what is written on the
same subject to Madame Hanska, Balzac's enormous power of reserve, and
his habit of deliberately misleading those who were not admitted to
his confidence, may be gauged.
George Sand tells us an anecdote which shows how easily, from his
anxiety not to wear his heart upon his sleeve, Balzac might be
misunderstood. He dined with her on January 29th, 1844, after a visit
to Russia, and related at table, with peals of laughter and apparently
enormous satisfaction, an instance which had come under his notice of
the ferocious exercise of absolute power. Any stranger listening,
would have thought him utterly heartless and brutal, but George Sand
knew better. She whispered to him: "That makes you inclined to cry,
doesn't it?"[*] He answered nothing; left off laughing, as if a spring
in him had broken; was very serious for the rest of the evening, and
did not say a word more about Russia.
[*] "Autour de la Table," by George Sand.
Balzac looked on the world as an arena; and as the occasion and the
audience arose, he suited himself with the utmost aplomb to the part
he intended to play, so that under the costume and the paint the real
Balzac is often difficult to discover. Sometimes he would pretend to
be rich and prosperous, when he thought an editor would thereby be
induced to offer him good terms; and sometimes, when it suited his
purpose, he would make the most of his poverty and of his pecuniary
embarrassments. Madame Hanska, from whom he required sympathy, heard
much of his desperate situation after the failure of Werdet, whom he
likens to the vulture that tormented Prometheus; but as it would not
answer for Emile de Girardin, the editor of _La Presse_, to know much
about Balzac's pecuniary difficulties, Madame de Girardin is assured
that the report of Werdet's supposed disaster is false, and Balzac
virtuously remarks that in the present century honesty is never
believed in.[*] Sometimes his want of candour appears to have its
origin in his hatred to allow that he is beaten, and there is
something childlike and naive in his vanity. We are amused when he
informs Madame Hanska that he is giving up the _Chronique de Paris_
--which, after a brilliant flourish of trumpets at the start, was a
complete failure--because the speeches in the Chambre des Deputes are
so silly that he abandons the idea of taking up politics, as he had
intended to do by means of journalism. In a later letter, however, he
is obliged to own that, though the _Chronique_ has been, of course, a
brilliant success, money is lacking, owing to the wickedness of
several abandoned characters, and that therefore he has been forced to
bring the publication to an end.
[*] "La Genese d'un Roman de Balzac," p. 152, by Le Vicomte de
Spoelberch de Lovenjoul.
Of one vanity he was completely free. He did not pose to posterity. Of
his books he thought much--each one was a masterpiece, more glorious
than the last; but he never imagined that people would be in the least
interested in his doings, and he did not care about their opinion of
him. Nevertheless there was occasionally a gleam of joy, when some one
unexpectedly showed a spontaneous admiration for his work. For
instance, in a Viennese concert-room, where the whole audience had
risen to do honour to the great author, a young man seized his hand
and put it to his lips, saying, "I kiss the hand that wrote
'Seraphita,'" and Balzac said afterwards to his sister, "They may deny
my talent, if they choose, but the memory of that student will always
comfort me."
His genius would, he hoped, be acknowledged one day by all the world;
but there was a singular and lovable absence of self-consciousness in
his character, and a peculiar humility and childlikeness under his
braggadocio and apparent arrogance. Perhaps this was the source of the
power of fascination he undoubtedly exercised over his contemporaries.
Nothing is more noticeable to any one reading about Balzac than the
difference between the tone of amused indulgence with which those who
knew him personally, speak of his peculiarities, and the contemptuous
or horrified comments of people who only heard from others of his
extraordinary doings.
He had bitter enemies as well as devoted friends; and his fighting
proclivities, his objection to allow that he is ever in the wrong, and
his habit of blaming others for his misfortunes, have had a great
effect in obscuring our knowledge of Balzac's life, as the people he
abused were naturally exasperated, and took up their pens, not to give
a fair account of what really happened, but to justify themselves
against Balzac's aspersions. Werdet's book is an instance of this.
Beneath the extravagant admiration he expresses for the "great
writer," with his "heart of gold," a glint can be seen from time to
time of the animus which inspired him when he wrote, and we feel that
his statements must be received with caution, and do not add much to
our real knowledge of Balzac.
Nevertheless, though there are still blank spaces to be filled, as
well as difficulties to overcome and puzzles to unravel, much fresh
information has lately been discovered about the great writer, notably
the "Lettres a l'Etrangere," published in 1899, a collection of some
of the letters written by Balzac, from 1833 to 1848, to Madame Hanska,
the Polish lady who afterwards became his wife. These letters, which
are the property of the Vicomte de Spoelberch de Lovenjoul, give many
interesting details, and alter the earlier view of several points in
Balzac's career and character; but the volume is large, and takes some
time to read. It is therefore thought, that as those who would seem
competent, by their knowledge and skill, to overcome the difficulties
of writing a complete and exhaustive life are silent, a short sketch,
which can claim nothing more than correctness of detail, may not be
unwelcome. It contains no attempt to give what could only be a very
inadequate criticism of the books of the great novelist; for that, the
reader must be referred to the many works by learned Frenchmen who
have made a lifelong study of the subject. It is written, however, in
the hope that the admirers of "Eugenie Grandet" and "Le Pere Goriot"
may like to read something of the author of these masterpieces, and
that even those who only know the great French novelist by reputation
may be interested to hear a little about the restless life of a man
who was a slave to his genius--was driven by its insistent voice to
engage in work which was enormously difficult to him, to lead an
abnormal and unhealthy life, and to wear out his exuberant physical
strength prematurely. He died with his powers at their highest and his
great task unfinished; and a sense of thankfulness for his own
mediocrity fills the reader, when he reaches the end of the life of
Balzac.