4 h 33 minAudiobook8 minSummaryRead it, hear it, the 15-minute summary, and print and large print at costPaperback · 6 × 9 in · 112 pagesHardcover · 6 × 9 in · 112 pagesAbout this book
What happens when a boy’s mind reaches beyond everything his world knows how to hold?
Louis Lambert, a tanner’s son from Montoire, reads everything he can find. At the strict college of Vendome, his hunger for ideas meets punishment and mockery. His only close friend becomes the narrator of his story, recalling a gifted boy who begins to ask whether thought is a force the will can gather and direct.
In Honoré de Balzac’s short philosophical novel, the search for knowledge carries a personal cost. Louis seeks a theory of thought, will and the soul, while school rules, poverty and the needs of the body press against his ambitions. Through his friend’s memories and letters, the story brings you close to a mind whose reach puts it under growing strain.
What you’ll discover
- A reader without rest Meet a country child whose appetite for books opens onto questions without easy answers.
- Friendship inside strict walls Enter Vendome through the memories of the schoolmate who becomes Louis’s only close companion.
- The force of thought Follow Louis’s theory that thought has substance and the will can direct its power.
- A search beyond reason Explore Balzac’s interest in Swedenborg and the spiritual questions that shape Louis’s restless thinking.
- The price of reaching further Consider what happens when extraordinary gifts meet institutions unable to make room for them.
Is it for you?
This book suits readers who like ideas as much as plot, and anyone curious about Balzac beyond his Paris novels. It is also for those drawn to stories of gifted children and schools. Readers wanting action and a broad social canvas may find it slow.
What’s inside
The key ideas, in the 15-minute summary
- A tanner's son who devours books
- The college of Vendome and a friendship
- Thought as a force that can be studied
- Punished for a manuscript
- Paris, poverty and a wider search
- Love and a mind under strain
- What the story is really about
- How the tale is told
Who’s who
- Louis LambertA tanner's son of extraordinary mind who reads without rest and seeks a theory of thought, will and the soul.
- The narratorLambert's schoolmate at Vendome, who admires him, keeps his memory and tells the story as a faithful friend.
- Pauline de VillenoixA young woman of good family who sees Lambert's worth and comes to love him.
- Lambert's uncleA priest who tries to help the boy find a place in the world and a path for his gifts.
- The school masters of VendomePriests who enforce strict rules and punish dreamers, and who cannot grasp the mind among their pupils.
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- Hardcover
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- Large print paperback
- 8.5 × 11 in. Printing soon: leave your email under Paperback or Hardcover above.
- Large print hardcover
- 8.5 × 11 in. Printing soon: leave your email under Paperback or Hardcover above.
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Louis Lambert
by Honoré de Balzac· 1832
A gifted schoolboy develops theories of thought, will and the soul.
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Language: English
“A writer of the 20th century may also, on occasion, feel imprisoned by his time, and reading the great 19th century novelists – Balzac, Dickens, Tolstoy, Dostoyevsky – may bring on a certain nostalgia.”
From the 15-minute summary · Key idea 1 of 8
A tanner's son who devours books
Louis Lambert is born in Montoire to a tanner. From his earliest years he shows a hunger for reading that astonishes everyone around him. The writer Madame de Staël, passing through the area, takes notice of him, and he is sent on to school with the hope of a fine career.
His father is a plain man, and the family has little money. Yet the boy picks up any book he can reach. He reads the Bible first, and then whatever else the house or the neighbours offer. His appetite is not for stories alone but for the large questions behind them.
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The author
Honoré de Balzac
1799–1850 · French novelist
Honoré de Balzac was a French novelist and playwright born in Tours in 1799. He lived and worked in Paris, where he died in 1850. He wrote The Magic Skin in 1831, Eugénie Grandet in 1833, and Father Goriot in 1835. Many of his works belong to La Comédie humaine.
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What is Louis Lambert about?
It tells of a gifted boy from Montoire who reads voraciously, builds a theory of thought and will, and suffers for his mind. A school friend tells the story and recalls his ideas, loves and strain.
Is Louis Lambert based on a true story?
It is fiction, but Balzac drew on his own schooldays at the college of Vendome and on his interest in mystical thinkers. Lambert partly mirrors the author's own youthful hunger for ideas.
When was Louis Lambert written?
Balzac first published it in 1832. He later included it among the Philosophical Studies in The Human Comedy, and he revised it in later editions.
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