Excerpt from Honore De Balzac: His Life and Writings Although it was published nine years ago, Miss Mary F. Sandars's "Balzac" remains a valuable piece of work, and I am extremely glad that it has been thought advisable to reproduce it in a new shape. It is a useful book for many reasons. In the first place it gives, without too lengthy criticism of particular works of Balzac, a most readable account of a complicated and interesting life. In the next place it is based on those "Lettres a I'Etrangere" which Balzac wrote to his Polish friend Madame Hanska, in the absence of which we have no means of ascertaining the inner life of the distinguished author. Books like those of Sir Frederick Wedmore in the "Great Writers" Series, or Miss Wormeley's Memoir, have become out of date. Mr. Saintsbury's various critical notices retain their original value, but, of course, the real source of much of our present knowledge is due to the collections of M. de Spoelberch de Lovenjoul together with various pamphlets replete with all the conscientious zeal of a thoroughgoing admirer. As Miss Sandars herself notes, Dr. George Brandes has written some valuable chapters in one of the volumes of his "Main Currents of Nineteenth-Century Literature," which, however, do not deal with the details of the novelist's life, but rather with the position which he holds in modern literature. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.