Béatrix

The du Guénics are one of the oldest families in Brittany, and Calyste is the twenty-one year old only son of the patriarch. A long-time family friend is determined to marry off one of her nieces to Calyste, but he’s in love with a woman of forty. Although Camille is flattered by the attentions of a man half her age, she recognizes the futility of his feelings. She decides that she’ll introduce him to her friend Béatrix, a twenty-eight year old woman of the world, with far-reaching implications for everyone involved. Balzac’s vivid characterizations provide the compelling backdrop to the story of Calyste’s introduction to love. Béatrix, as originally written and published, contained only the first two parts of the present novel; Balzac didn’t add the third until several years later.