Taking his cue from a remark of Napoleon’s during the drafting of the civil code, the young Balzac sets out to treat marriage as a science. In numbered meditations, statistics and aphorisms he classifies wives, examines boarding schools and honeymoons, diagnoses the first symptoms of trouble and lays out a treatise of marital policy for the anxious husband.
Satire, cynicism and sharp social observation from the author of the Human Comedy, with attitudes to women very much of 1829. Download the free EPUB.