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Maureen McGranaghan @mcgranaghan.bsky.social · 14h

"Who would suppose, Mademoiselle, that this young man with his maidenly air is a tiger with claws of steel who'll tear a reputation as easily as no doubt he tears off your dressing-gown when you're slow in removing it..." Did he really say that? Yep. Dauriat. #balzactogether

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Maureen McGranaghan @mcgranaghan.bsky.social · 14h

And the mentor Lousteau with his protégé Lucien are a formidable pair. Lousteau makes the argument; Lucien adroitly executes. #balzactogether

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Maureen McGranaghan @mcgranaghan.bsky.social · 14h

"Oh come, my dear, learn your trade...Even if the book's a masterpiece, your pen must prove that it's a work of stupid nonsense, a dangerous and unwholesome work...a journalist is an acrobat." I think Lousteau relishes his tutelage. #balzactogether

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Maureen McGranaghan @mcgranaghan.bsky.social · 06/10/2026

I do not find myself drawn to Lucien, but then I am not confronted with his arresting beauty. I wonder if both women and men are responding to it, on some level. On the page, a character is stripped of that. I can imagine, but it's not the same. #balzactogether

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Maureen McGranaghan @mcgranaghan.bsky.social · 03/10/2026

The boots again! Camusot handles himself with grace (even if he is just biding his time). "A cold shudder ran down Lucien's back at the prospect of having a woman, an actress, and a household on his hands." But he's "captivated by the picturesque aspects of this Bohemian life." 😬 #BalzacTogether

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Maureen McGranaghan @mcgranaghan.bsky.social · 03/10/2026

I guess I was shocked by it. I thought of the various tones family scenes can take--a humorous chaos in Dickens (even when he's critical of the parents), a sweet chaos in other instances, a pitiable character (also Dickens), but here it's a wholly ugly chaos. No affection in Balzac's rendering.

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Maureen McGranaghan @mcgranaghan.bsky.social · 03/10/2026

"This writer, nauseated with married life, too weak-willed to leave his wife and children but imaginative enough always to feel ashamed of them, was bound to resent other's people success and be discontented..." The "paterfamilias...can be kind to no one, not even children." YIKES #BalzacTogether

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Maureen McGranaghan @mcgranaghan.bsky.social · 02/10/2026

Total idealism vs. total corruption. Hmm.

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Maureen McGranaghan @mcgranaghan.bsky.social · 02/10/2026

"'We are going to bring out a journal in which neither truth nor justice will ever be outraged, in which we shall disseminate doctrines useful to humanity...' 'You'll need a lot of capital.' Lucien answered. 'No,' said d'Arthez, 'only self-devotion.'" 😬 #balzactogether

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Maureen McGranaghan @mcgranaghan.bsky.social · 02/10/2026

"From chapter to chapter, the skillful and devoted pen of these great but as yet unknown men had changed dross into rich ore." The Cenacle rewrote Lucien's book for him. Where's the integrity or the learning in that? Hmm. #balzactogether

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Maureen McGranaghan @mcgranaghan.bsky.social · 02/10/2026

Well put. What would David and Eve say?

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Maureen McGranaghan @mcgranaghan.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

Ah, Camusot and the boots. "There are boots everywhere. These would look better in a shoemaker's shop-window or strolling about on a man's legs in the boulevards. Here, however, with no legs in them, they tell a tale which doesn't argue for fidelity." Trying for stoicism. #balzactogether

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Maureen McGranaghan @mcgranaghan.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

Vignon delivers quite a speech re: journalism and the unstoppable French wit. "A newspaper will serve up its father raw, with no other seasoning than its jokes, rather than fail to interest or amuse its public." Lucien is seduced by the irreverence--and Coralie. #balzactogether

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Maureen McGranaghan @mcgranaghan.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

"He's so old, this young actor, that he frightens people: they fear his oldness may be passed on like a contagious disease." "This bolero has enough in it to attract all the elderly gentlemen who don't know what to do with the remnants of their love life." The pen of young Lucien. #balzactogether

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Maureen McGranaghan @mcgranaghan.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

I'm trying to decide if Lucien's article is as witty as everyone seems to think it is--a "revolution in journalism." Like one of those bold new voices proclaimed by book jackets. Hmm. Quoting a couple of my favorite lines from it below. #balzactogether

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Maureen McGranaghan @mcgranaghan.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

Eager to scandalize the foreign dignitary...

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Maureen McGranaghan @mcgranaghan.bsky.social · 28/09/2026

"'A German! He'll drink well, listen hard, and we'll say so many outrageous things that he'll write to his Court about them,' cried Blondet. 'Which, of all of us, is a sufficiently grave personage to go down and speak to him?' asked Finot." Dinner at Florine's. #BalzacTogether

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Maureen McGranaghan @mcgranaghan.bsky.social · 26/09/2026

"In these dirty corridors encumbered with stage machinery and reeking with oil-lamps reigns a pestilence which destroys the soul. In them life has no longer anything sacred or real...Everything looked hideous." Balzac: NOT romantic about the theatre. 🤣 😬 #balzactogether

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Maureen McGranaghan @mcgranaghan.bsky.social · 26/09/2026

Camusot: "after pocketing the thousand and one affronts of a commercial career [he] has no intention of taking leave of the world before he has enjoyed his full share of this life's pleasures." #balzactogether

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Maureen McGranaghan @mcgranaghan.bsky.social · 26/09/2026

"There is a splendor of humility in a love-stricken courtesan which can give points to the angels." Hunt I like the Raine better. On one hand, a lovely passage, but it makes me recoil, thinking of Madame Butterfly (for instance)--the romanticization of these unequal relationships. #balzactogether

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Maureen McGranaghan @mcgranaghan.bsky.social · 24/09/2026

Not since the beginning of chapt. 10, which begins with his toilette, culminating in "Never did a more attractive-looking young man step down from the 'mountain' of the Latin quarter." Lucien's beauty is not lost on people, women especially. He just needs some hard wit to go with it! #balzactogether

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Maureen McGranaghan @mcgranaghan.bsky.social · 23/09/2026

I know! Balzac seems to be a natural everything! I'm in awe of his breadth of knowledge and command of diverse subjects. And he's great with descriptions of people and places, makes them lively.

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Maureen McGranaghan @mcgranaghan.bsky.social · 22/09/2026

"Keep hold of my arm unless you want to fall through a trap-door, bring a forest down on you, overturn a palace or run foul of a thatched cottage," said Etienne to Lucien. 🤣 ("Behind the Scenes") #balzactogether

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Maureen McGranaghan @mcgranaghan.bsky.social · 22/09/2026

"The most dangerous thing is to churn out wit all alone in a corner." #balzactogether

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Maureen McGranaghan @mcgranaghan.bsky.social · 21/09/2026

I'm reading the Hunt in print, but the ebook I downloaded from Hoopla has only three chapters: Two Poets, A Distinguished Provincial at Paris, and Eve and David.

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Maureen McGranaghan @mcgranaghan.bsky.social · 21/09/2026

"I've been offered eleven hundred manuscripts...I shall soon need an administrative staff to control the receipt of manuscripts and a reading committee to examine them..." (Dauriat, the speculator in literature) Publishers have been inundated for a couple centuries now, at least. 😬 #balzactogether

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Reposted by Maureen McGranaghan

Alison @alisonjaye.bsky.social · 19/09/2026

“There’s Finot, the director of my paper, chatting with a talented young man, Felicien Vernou, a little rascal who’s as nasty as an unmentionable disease.” Leading with a compliment, ending with a zinger. #balzactogether

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Reposted by Maureen McGranaghan

christina500 @christina500.bsky.social · 19/09/2026

Lucien felt like an embryo in this company. 'Must one really sacrifice one's dignity?' he thought. 'Put on your hat, Nathan! You have written a fine book, and this critic has only written an article!' 276 P2 Lost Illusions #Balzactogether Week 8 #Lucien

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Maureen McGranaghan @mcgranaghan.bsky.social · 19/09/2026

"As evening fell, this terrible bazaar became resplendent in its poetry." The Wooden Galleries #balzactogether

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Maureen McGranaghan @mcgranaghan.bsky.social · 19/09/2026

"Once the crowd arrived, young people hungry for literature...did their reading--gratis--at the booksellers' shop windows. The assistants employed to watch over the books...charitably allowed these poor young men to go on turning the pages." Love this. But thankful for libraries! #balzactogether

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Maureen McGranaghan @mcgranaghan.bsky.social · 17/09/2026

Lousteau now dreams of being promoted to a big paper, having his own flat, and making Florine's career. Maybe even becoming an honest man ("anything may happen"). But then he recalls his "fine tragedy" and "a poem which will die on my hands," plus his once kind, pure heart.

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Maureen McGranaghan @mcgranaghan.bsky.social · 17/09/2026

"Lousteau, aware that Lucien's mind was made up, was recruiting him...The one was out for a corporal's stripes, the other wanted to join the ranks." I guess Lucien's pals are right to worry. Hmm. #balzactogether

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Maureen McGranaghan @mcgranaghan.bsky.social · 17/09/2026

Lousteau is describing the world of Jasper Milvain in New Grub Street...except it sounds even worse, reviewers entirely mercenary, review copies and theatre comps blatantly sold by the recipients, books panned unless such copies are forthcoming, and no merit recognized without a fee. #balzactogether

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Maureen McGranaghan @mcgranaghan.bsky.social · 17/09/2026

"Excited by the prospect of an immediate wrestle between mankind and himself, the inexperienced young man had no idea how real was the spiritual degradation which the journalist denounced." #balzactogether

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Maureen McGranaghan @mcgranaghan.bsky.social · 17/09/2026

"You will find out as I did that underneath your beautiful dream-world is the turmoil of men, passions, and needs." But Lucien sees in this a sort of dream-world too, a "terrible poetry of difficulties ahead." Ah, still romanticizing. #balzactogether

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Maureen McGranaghan @mcgranaghan.bsky.social · 17/09/2026

I use Hoopla for these (through my library).

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Maureen McGranaghan @mcgranaghan.bsky.social · 16/09/2026

"At present, d'Arthez was correcting the manuscript of The Archer of Charles the Ninth; he...wrote the finest pages to be found in it and composed the splendid preface which perhaps overshadows the work..." D'Arthez is the real thing. Lucien not so much. #balzactogether

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Maureen McGranaghan @mcgranaghan.bsky.social · 16/09/2026

I'm listening to her translation (and reading the Hunt). I love Marriage's turns of phrase. In Pere Goriot too.

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Maureen McGranaghan @mcgranaghan.bsky.social · 16/09/2026

He could take a lesson from David, whose political neutrality cost him dearly in obtaining business for the press.

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Maureen McGranaghan @mcgranaghan.bsky.social · 14/09/2026

"Le Solitaire, a novel...whose abuse of inversions must have wearied the journalists. 'The Solitary in the provinces appearing the ladies astonishes.' ''Read backwards, astonishes The Solitary the Academicians by its exceptional beauty.'" 😂 #Balzactogether

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Maureen McGranaghan @mcgranaghan.bsky.social · 14/09/2026

"'A complaint no doubt...But if you are demanding satisfaction I am ready,' he added, with a glance at an array of foils and pistols, an up-to-date panoply bundled together in a corner." Subscriptions and duels--the daily business of a newspaper! #Balzactogether

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Maureen McGranaghan @mcgranaghan.bsky.social · 14/09/2026

Lucien's family and friends seem to believe in his talent but universally doubt his character. They are eager to give him money to keep him on course (which apparently isn't going to work). I worry about David and Eve's future and child if they're both secretly funding Lucien. 😬 #balzactogether

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Maureen McGranaghan @mcgranaghan.bsky.social · 13/09/2026

"That, in a word, is what journalism does. Friendship condones mistakes and the rash impulses of passion, but it must be implacable to anyone who decides to barter away his soul, his intellect, and his thought." Balzac burned by the press? #BalzacTogether

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Maureen McGranaghan @mcgranaghan.bsky.social · 13/09/2026

"If you had the misfortune to kill your mistress, I would help you to conceal the crime and could still feel some respect for you. But if you took to espionage I should shrink from you in horror, for you would be adopting treachery and infamy as a system." Hmm. #BalzacTogether

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Maureen McGranaghan @mcgranaghan.bsky.social · 13/09/2026

"One evening Chrestien thought of going out singing in the Champs-Elysées with a scarf and four candles, but he was commissioned to write a pamphlet for a man with political ambitions and provided him with six hundred francs' worth of Machiavelli." Like these guys more all the time. #BalzacTogether

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Maureen McGranaghan @mcgranaghan.bsky.social · 13/09/2026

"Each of his friends was aware of...the dejection resulting from the efforts of a mind overstrained by the contemplation of nature, the interpretation of which is the poet's function." And then they give him money. Poets take note: here is your GoFundMe script! 🤣 #BalzacTogether

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