Honoré de Balzac

A woman sent against a royalist falls for her enemy.

A merchant’s daughter marries a painter from a different world.

A Paris moneylender holds a family's fortune in his hands.

A young man's wishes come at the cost of life.

A soldier declared dead returns to reclaim his former life.

A gifted schoolboy develops theories of thought, will and the soul.

A sheltered daughter’s love challenges her father’s rule of money.

A soldier visits a doctor who has transformed a village.

Two people love a being who reaches beyond human life.

A student seeks status while a father impoverishes himself.

A young man's marriage plans become a struggle over money.

A young man loves a married woman bound by duty.

A Paris perfumer risks his reputation through ambition and debt.

A young nobleman's obsession with love clashes with social ambition.

A young poet seeks fame in a city of bargains.

An orphan's future is threatened by her guardian's greedy relatives.

A senator’s kidnapping entangles former nobles in a political crime.

Two brothers face a struggle over family money and loyalty.

A young woman's secret letters lead to mistaken love.

An elderly musician’s art collection draws others into schemes.

A sculptor mistakes an opera singer for his ideal woman.

A wealthy son encounters his father's means of defeating death.

A secret brotherhood intervenes in three stories of Parisian desire.

French stories follow lives shaped by passion, war, and vanity.

Marriage becomes the subject of a mock scientific study.