Two provincial comedies from La Comédie humaine. In The Illustrious Gaudissart a glib Parisian commercial traveller meets his match among the wits of Touraine. In The Muse of the Department, written a decade later, Dinah de La Baudraye, the bored literary queen of Sancerre, is dazzled by visitors from the capital.
A fine pairing of early and late Balzac on the clash between Paris and the provinces. Download the free EPUB.