Cousin Bette

Cover -- Copyright Page -- Title Page -- Contents -- Introduction -- Note on the Text -- Select Bibliography -- A Chronology of HonorÉ De Balzac -- Map -- COUSIN BETTE -- 1. Where will love find a niche? -- 2. From father-in-law to mother-in-law -- 3. Josépha -- 4. The perfumer's sudden access of pity -- 5. The way to arrange a marriage for a beautiful girl with no money -- 6. The Captain loses the battle -- 7. A woman's fine life-story -- 8. Hortense -- 9. Character sketch of an old maid -- 10. Bette's admirer -- 11. Conversation between an old maid and a young one.;Cousin Bette (1846) is considered to be Balzac's last great novel, and a key work in his Human Comedy. Set in the Paris of the 1830s and 1840s, it is a complex tale of the devastating effect of violent jealousy and sexual passion. Against a meticulously detailed backdrop of a post-Napoleonic France struggling with massive industrial and economic change, Balzac's characters span many classes of society, from impoverished workers and wealthy courtesans to successful businessmen and official dignitaries. The tragic outcome of the novel is relieved by occasional flashes of ironic comedy and the eme.