This collection of enchanting tales spotlights the works of 5 outstanding French writers prominent during the 19th century. Included are Trilby, or the Elf of Argyll, by Charles Nodier, Théophile Gautier's The Amorous Dead Woman, as well as works by Prosper Mérimée, Guy de Maupassant, and Villiers de l'Isle-Adam. Informative introduction and notes.

Included are Trilby, or the Elf of Argyll, by Charles Nodier, Théophile Gautier's The Amorous Dead Woman, as well as works by Prosper Mérimée, Guy de Maupassant, and Villiers de l'Isle-Adam.

French text and English translations on facing pages of six stories: Merimée's Mateo Falcone, Nerval's Sylvie, Daudet's La mule du Pape, Flaubert's Hérodias, Zola's L’attaque du moulin,, de Maupassant's Mademoiselle Perle.

Set amid the salon society of fin-de-siècle Paris, these captivating tales offer satirical and moving depictions of metropolitan life. Proust's stunning debut chronicles the lives, loves, manners, and motivations of a fascinating cast of characters. These philosophical reflections, brief narratives, and prose poems established the 22-year-old author as a remarkable collector of exquisitely poignant sensations and recollections. Appropriate for intermediate-level students of French, this dual-language volume is equally suited to classroom use and to independent study. New English translations appear on pages facing the original French text. Readers will find this volume a fascinating introduction to the works of a key figure of French literature as well as a valuable aid to mastering one of the world's most enchanting languages. Dover (2014) original publication.

Balzac's reputation is as a novelist. But short stories make up over half La Comédie humaine, besides scores of other tales and articles. Short forms appear early in Balzac's output, and shape his work throughout his career. Balzac's Shorter Fictions looks at the whole of this corpus, at the nature of short fiction, and at how Balzac's novels developed from his stories - at the links between literary genesis and genre. It explores the roles of short fiction in Balzac's creation, its part in producing effects of virtuality and perspective, and reflects ultimately on the relationship between brevity and length in La Comédie humaine. This, the first complete English-language study of Balzac's work for over forty years, synthesizes recent research on Balzac's practice within the context of modern thought on the author. It is an indispensable book for students and scholars of Balzac, and for all those interested in prose fiction.