La Comédie humaine

by Honoré de Balzac

• Author's Introduction to The Human Comedy, 1842

(See also Repertory Of The Comedie Humaine for a comprehensive index of characters.)

Studies of Manners

Scenes From Private Life

• At the Sign of the Cat and Racket
• The Ball at Sceaux
• The Purse
• The Vendetta
• Madame Firmiani
• A Second Home
• Domestic Peace
• The Imaginary Mistress
• Study of a Woman
• Another Study of a Woman
• La Grand Breteche
• Albert Savarus
• Letters of Two Brides
• A Daughter of Eve
• A Woman of Thirty
• The Deserted Woman
• La Grenadiere
• The Message
• Gobseck
• A Marriage Contract
• A Start in Life
• Modeste Mignon
• Beatrix
• Honorine
• Colonel Chabert
• The Atheist's Mass
• The Commission in Lunacy
• Pierre Grassou

Scenes From Provincial Life

• Ursule Mirouet
• Eugénie Grandet
• The Celibates:
  • Pierrette
  • The Vicar of Tours
• A Bachelor's Establishment
• Parisians in the Country:
  • The Illustrious Gaudissart
  • The Muse of the Department
• The Jealousies of a Country Town
  • The Old Maid
  • The Collection of Antiquities
• The Lily of the Valley
• Lost Illusions (Les Illusions perdues)
  • The Two Poets
  • A Distinguished Provincial at Paris
  • Eve and David

Scenes From Parisian Life

• Scenes from a Courtesan's Life
  • Esther Happy
  • What Love Costs an Old Man
  • The End of Evil Ways
  • Vautrin's Last Avatar
• A Prince of Bohemia
• A Man of Business
• Gaudissart II.
• The Unconscious Comedians
• The Thirteen
  • Ferragus
  • The Duchesse de Langeais
  • The Girl with the Golden Eyes
• Father Goriot
• The Rise and Fall of Cesar Birotteau
• The Firm of Nucingen
• The Secrets of a Princess
• The Government Clerks
• Sarrasine
• Facino Cane
• Poor Relations
  • Cousin Bette
  • Cousin Pons
• The Middle Classes

Scenes From Political Life

• The Gondreville Mystery or An Historical Mystery (transcription project)
• An Episode Under the Terror
• The Seamy Side of History or The Brotherhood of Consolation
  • Madame de la Chanterie
  • Initiated or The Initiate
• Z. Marcas
• The Member for Arcis or The Deputy for Arcis

Scenes From Military Life

• The Chouans
• A Passion in the Desert (see also "A Passion in the Desert" in The Strand Magazine, 1 (2) (February 1891))

Scenes From Country Life

• The Country Doctor
• The Country Parson or The Village Rector
• The Peasantry or Sons of the Soil

Philosophical Studies

• The Magic Skin (La Peau de chagrin)
• The Quest of the Absolute or The Alkahest
• Christ in Flanders
• Melmoth Reconciled
• The Unknown Masterpiece or The Hidden Masterpiece (1834) translated by Katharine Prescott Wormeley
• The Hated Son
• Gambara
• Massimilla Doni
• The Maranas or Juana
• Farewell
• The Conscript or The Recruit
• El Verdugo
• A Seaside Tragedy or A Drama on the Seashore
• The Red Inn
• The Elixir of Life
• Maitre Cornelius
• Catherine de Medici
  • The Calvinist Martyr
  • The Ruggieri's Secret
  • The Two Dreams
• Louis Lambert
• Les Proscrits (1831)
  • The Exiles, translation by Clara Bell (1899)
  • The Exiles, translation by William Walton (1897)
  • The Exiles, translation by Katherine Wormeley (1893)
• Seraphita

Analytical Studies

• The Physiology of Marriage
• Pathology of the Social Life