A PHENOMENON more than a man, the very name Balzac exudes energy and encyclopedic descriptions of men and morals. With his undefeatable energy and voracious appetite — for every kind of sensation and for life itself — everything about Honoré de Balzac appears to be larger than life.

But nothing could be bigger than his sprawling life’s work, collectively titled The Human Comedy, spread over scores of volumes, seemingly interminable and exhaustive, containing more masterpieces than the work of a dozen of his contemporaries put together. One is inclined to speak about him reverently as the greatest novelist the world has ever known but then some of his compatriots make us stop short of making such pronouncements, such as Stendhal, Flaubert and Proust. Thinking in such terms today would make us turn towards the great Russians or the Latin Americans. Yet, there is nobody like Balzac and he deserves to be called the most monumental novelist among them all.

There is a listing of all the books Balzac had completed appended at the end of Graham Robb’s informative biography which almost makes Balzac come alive as if he was stepping out from the pages of his novels. Right at the end of the appendix, Robb observes that while the major novels are reprinted, eager readers who want to explore the rest of the series have to rely “on chance encounters in second-hand bookshops,” and goes on to make the comment that “unknown masterpieces are waiting to be rediscovered.” This is precisely what has happened in the case of the stories included in New York Review Books’ selection from Blazac’s works. Newly-translated for inclusion in this volume, these stories are fascinating and forceful in their own way.

The Human Comedy is perhaps a baffling title for a volume of Balzac’s short stories. Reiterating that “Balzac is known for his immensity, excess,” editor Peter Brooks seems to be fully cognisant of the apparent contradictions and confirms right at the beginning of his insightful introduction that “it may seem a paradox, then, to link Balzac’s vast Human Comedy to the adjective short,” since “we think of Balzac as long, often too long — descriptions, explanations that correspond to the leisure associated with reading 19th-century novels. … His novels are often freighted with extended presentations of things and people, and weighty excurses on every imaginable subject.” It is not only a discovery but a matter of relief that one can approach the power of Balzac without being pulled into such weighty excursions. In this manner, the book changes and alters my perception of Balzac and The Human Comedy.

The introduction contextualises Balzac in the 19th century as well as the oral tradition of storytelling. Brooks knows how to be learned without being heavy or pedantic. He is well worth quoting at length when he writes about the special position of these stories which are “among the best work Balzac did.” In his words, “here [Balzac] produces his striking effects, his thunderous climaxes, his acute psychological twists with greater economy than in the full-length novels. And he uses short fiction to try out some of his boldest imaginative flights.” The stories selected here display Balzac’s imagination at its best.

The opening story in the collection is ‘Facino Cane’ and begins with a reference to the dervish in The Arabian Nights who would mingle with the crowds in the city streets. A blind musician playing at a wedding party tells a story of intrigue, imprisonment, unimaginable wealth and the power of love while revealing the secret of treasures lying unclaimed in Venice. There is an unfulfilled promise to go back to Venice and possess all this wealth but the poor man dies after catching a cold, the promise of all this wealth remaining an elusive shadow.

‘Another Study of Womankind’ begins at a leisurely note as an anecdote one could hear at a party but runs into jealousy and deceit as it reaches its climax in a manner which sends a shiver down your spine. The ending could have been straight out of Anarkali’s story, ordered to be killed by the vengeful emperor.

‘The Red Inn’ is another such story in which a dinnertime conversation opens up a secret of the past, leading to the exposure of a gruesome murder committed many years ago and tied up with unexplained and sudden wealth.

The most surprising and dazzling story is called ‘A Passion in the Desert’. It is narrated by a soldier lost in the desert of North Africa but the real story is the passionate relationship which develops between him and a panther, bordering on the uncanny. The story would have appeared to be somewhat like a fantasy but its descriptions become more and more sensuous as the relationship between the two progresses.

The lonely and haunting setting of the desert serves to highlight the elements of the strange and the uncanny. Surely, this must be one of the extraordinary tales I have ever read. Like all such tales, it ends on a note of tragedy, but how else could it have ended and how long could the relationship have lasted? And yet, what name would one give to this relationship, if not love and passion in which man and beast bonded together. Mind you, this one is not for the squeamish and is by no means one of those simple and sweet tales of a dumb animal’s loyalty and devotion to its master which one enjoyed as a child.

French history and politics form the background of ‘Z. Marcas’ but the story is universal in its appeal. ‘Gobseck’ is linked with some of the characters in Balzac’s best known novel Pere Goriot and moves from relationships to greed and wealth. Here Balzac is very much in his own territory as he writes of avarice and the madness to accumulate wealth. As he writes about the passion for money, one understands why Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels paid him such high compliments, insisting that they had learnt much from him. It is human nature and the economic basis of capitalist society as it twists and shapes the world that Balzac writes best about.

The last and longest tale touches upon obsession and passion but in a manner which is different from the other stories. It is not so much a short story but a novella, a befitting conclusion to the volume which presents Balzac in many colours, some of which are unknown to English language readers.

Prometheus is the title used to describe Balzac by Andre Maurois in his highly readable biography in the series of 19th century French writers which uses the more obvious title Titans for Alexandre Dumas and his son, Olympio for Victor Hugo and Leila for George Sand. Balzac stands above many of them, dwarfing them with his gigantic presence.

The reviewer is a fiction writer and critic

The Human Comedy: Selected Stories

(STORIES)

By Honoré De Balzac

Edited by Peter Brooks

New York Review Books Classics, New York

ISBN 1590176642

464pp.