Balsamo, the Magician or, The Memoirs of a Physician

Dumas, Alexandre, 1802-1870Project Gutenberg · United StatesDec 2019

Rating 3.7
Word count
528K words
Chapters
53

Tags

English Originals Historical Fiction Suspense ThrillerFrench HistoryHistorical LegendFate and FortuneRevenge and PlotCourt IntrigueComplex HumanityDoctor's NotesPopular Narrative19th Century

Summary

Project Gutenberg was the first provider of free electronic books, or eBooks. Michael Hart, founder of Project Gutenberg, invented eBooks in 1971 and his memory continues to inspire the creation of eBooks and related technologies today.Balsamo, the Magician; or, The Memoirs of a Physician by Alexandre DumasAuthor: Dumas, Alexandre, 1802-1870,Language: English, Class: PQ: Language and Literatures: Romance literatures: French, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, Release Date: May 30, 2014

Editor's review

This novel by Alexandre Dumas, Balsamo the Magician; or, The Memoirs of a Physician, belongs to his sequence of historical romances set on the eve of the French Revolution, centering on the mysterious figure Balsamo and rumors entwining the court, medicine, and the occult. It continues Dumas's gift for multi-stranded plotting and dramatic dialogue, fusing historical figures with fictional adventure; it is both an accessible popular novel and a reflection of eighteenth-century French society's complex attitude toward science, superstition, and power. The Project Gutenberg edition is a public-domain English electronic text, convenient for searching and comparative reading. It serves as a useful supplement for understanding the landscape of Dumas's historical fiction, and suits readers interested in pre-Revolutionary court intrigues, pseudo-science, and the intellectual tensions of the Enlightenment. Read it within the Joseph Balsamo series for context, and distinguish literary embellishment from historical fact.

Who it's for

A good fit for

Not a good fit for

Reading tips

  1. Read the preface or look up background on the Balsamo series first, and clarify the character relationships before entering the main text.
  2. Mark historical figures and fictional plot separately to avoid citing the novel as historical source.
  3. Read the English text alongside a translation where useful; look up occult terminology before continuing.
  4. Proceed chapter by chapter and keep character notes to reduce confusion from the multi-stranded narrative.

About the publisher

Project Gutenberg United States · Founded in 1971

Project Gutenberg is a digital publishing project focused on public-domain ebooks. Its publishing direction centers on classic literary works whose copyright has expired, covering genres such as poetry, drama, fiction, and epic. Representative books include Lyrical Ballads by Wordsworth and Coleridge, Proust's Du côté de chez Swann, Shakespeare's Macbeth and The Complete Works of William Shakespeare, Homer's The Iliad, Dante's La Divina Comèdia: Purgatòri, Cervantes's The History of Don Quixote, Volume 2, and Grahame's The Wind in the Willows. Its author resources consist mainly of classic Western writers such as Wordsworth, Proust, Shakespeare, Homer, Dante, Cervantes, Grahame, and Tolstoy. Its publishing feature is the provision of freely accessible ebooks in EPUB and Kindle formats; it is not a traditional publisher, and publicly available information is limited.

Contents

  1. 1
  2. 2
  3. 3
  4. 4
  5. 5
  6. 6
  7. 7
  8. 8
  9. 9
  10. 10
  11. 11
  12. 12
  13. 13
  14. 14
  15. 15
  16. 16
  17. 17
  18. 18
  19. 19
  20. 20
  21. 21
  22. 22
  23. 23
  24. 24
  25. 25
  26. 26
  27. 27
  28. 28
  29. 29
  30. 30
  31. 31
  32. 32
  33. 33
  34. 34
  35. 35
  36. 36
  37. 37
  38. 38
  39. 39
  40. 40
  41. 41
  42. 42
  43. 43
  44. 44
  45. 45
  46. 46
  47. 47
  48. 48
  49. 49
  50. 50
  51. 51
  52. 52
  53. 53

FAQ

Is this book in the same style as The Count of Monte Cristo? It shares Dumas's historical romance approach and both rely on suspense and dialogue to drive the story, but this book is closer to eighteenth-century French court and occult themes, with denser historical background and a balance of adventure and mystery; the reading pace is not entirely the same.
What is the nature of the Project Gutenberg edition? It is a free English electronic text based on a public-domain work, convenient for searching, copying, and comparative reading, but it usually lacks the notes and introduction of a modern translation; consult the page for version details.
Do I need to know about the French Revolution before reading? Systematic study is not required, but understanding the social hierarchy and court atmosphere on the eve of the Revolution makes the characters' motives and conflicts easier to follow. Read a brief background introduction first, then enter the novel.

This site is an index: you start “Search all sources” in your browser, and the entries it lists all point to third-party sites; please judge their availability yourself.

About the author

Dumas, Alexandre, 1802-1870 Author

Alexandre Dumas (1802–1870) was a major French novelist and playwright of the nineteenth century. The collection here holds 133 of his works, including editions in several languages, which shows how widely they have circulated. His best-known works include The Three Musketeers and The Count of Monte Cristo, the latter often published in volumes such as Volume III, Volume II, Volume I, and Volume IV. His writing is usually set against historical backgrounds, with intricate plots and vivid characters, and he was skilled at unfolding grand narratives in serial form, combining adventure, rivalry, and legend. Both novels have been translated into many languages and frequently issued in illustrated editions, leaving a lasting influence on popular literature and on film and television adaptations. Public information is limited, so details of his life and critical assessments are not developed here; readers may discover his narrative appeal through the works themselves.