Contents
List of Illustrations
Acknowledgments
Chapter 1. Introduction: The Prime Movers
I. Rhetorical Forms of Realism
Chapter 2. Mimetic Figures of Semiosis
Chapter 3. From Heteronomy to Unity: Les Chouans
Chapter 4. Tenebrous Affairs and Necessary Explications
Chapter 5. Self-Narration and the Fakery of Imitation
Chapter 6. The Double Representation of the History of César Birotteau
Chapter 7. La Maison Nucingen, a Financial Narrative
II. Semiotic Images of Realism
Chapter 8. Myth and Mendacity: Pierrette and Beatrice Cenci
Chapter 9. The Corset of La Vieille Fille
Chapter 10. Genealogy and the Unmarried in La Rabouilleuse
Chapter 11. Ursule Mirouët: Genealogy and Inheritance
Chapter 12. Un Prince de la Bohème and Pierre Grassou, or How Love Makes Money
Chapter 13. Voyages of Reflection, Reflections on Voyages
III. Mimetic Structures of Realism
Chapter 14. Balzac and Poe: Realizing Magnetism
Chapter 15. Chemistry and Composition: La Recherche de L’Absolu
Chapter 16. The Capital of Money and the Science of Magnetism: Melmoth Réconcilié
Chapter 17. Love, Music, and Opium: Medical Semiotics of Massimilla Doni
Chapter 18. The Language of Sex
Chapter 19. Composed Past and Historical Present
Chapter 20. Problems of Closure
Chapter 21. Conclusion: Balzac’s Invention of Realism
Bibliography
Index