The Recruit

Balzac, Honoré de, 1799-1850Project Gutenberg · United StatesDec 2019

3.4

Word count: 31K words
Chapters: 4

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.The Recruit by Honoré de BalzacAuthor: Balzac, Honoré de, 1799-1850,Language: English, Class: PQ: Language and Literatures: Romance literatures: French, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, Release Date: Jul 13, 2005

Editor's review

“The Recruit” is a short story by Balzac, likewise included in his large body of work, concise in length and concentrated in narrative. The work unfolds around a character’s choice in a specific historical situation, continuing Balzac’s concern with the relationship between individual fate and the social environment. The story advances through spare scenes and restrained dialogue; character motives are revealed layer by layer within a limited space, and the ending often leaves a lingering resonance worth pondering. This edition is the public-domain English eBook provided by Project Gutenberg; the text is easy to obtain and suitable as material for close reading of short fiction. For readers new to Balzac, such short stories can serve as a lightweight entry into his world; for those familiar with his novels, they reveal the concise technique with which the author handles short-story structure. When reading, pay attention to how character relationships are set up and how turning points are prepared, and note how narrative perspective affects the reader’s judgment of events.

Who it's for

A good fit for

Beginner readers who want to encounter Balzac’s work in a relatively short time
Students who need short texts for analysis in English and American literature courses
Readers interested in the theme of personal choice in historical situations
Literature lovers who enjoy close reading short stories and savoring narrative structure

Not a good fit for

Readers expecting complex, long-form plots and multi-stranded narratives
Readers who prefer modern vernacular translations and are unused to classical English expression
Readers who only want Balzac’s most famous major novels

Reading tips

On the first reading, focus on where the story goes; on the second, note the hints and omissions in characters’ dialogue.
Mark where turns occur as you read and think about why the author placed a change there.
You may first read a Chinese introduction for background, then read the English original to lower the barrier to understanding.
After finishing, try to summarize the characters’ motives in one paragraph to check your grasp of the text.

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.

FAQ

What is the relationship between this story and Balzac’s novels?

It is part of Balzac’s short fiction and shares with his novels an observational perspective on human nature and society, but its plot is independent, so the novels need not be read first. The short story presents a situation or a choice more concentratively; it can serve as a sample for understanding Balzac’s narrative interests and makes it easy to compare his techniques with those in the novels.

What are the features of the Project Gutenberg edition?

This edition is a free public-domain eBook, with text from Project Gutenberg, easy to download, search, and cite. It offers an English translation, laid out mainly as plain text, without modern annotations or an introduction. Readers who need background material should consult literary histories or introductory guides separately.

In what settings is it suitable to read?

Because it is short, it is suitable for reading in one sitting during a commute, before sleep, or for course preparation, and also works well as a discussion text for a book club. It is best to read it through once and then return to key passages, so that fragmented reading does not weaken the effect of the ending. For classroom use, a simple character-relationship chart can support discussion.

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About the author

Balzac, Honoré de, 1799-1850 Author

Honoré de Balzac (1799–1850) was a French novelist best known for his vast series La Comédie humaine. The library holds 143 of his works, including Father Goriot, Lost Illusions, Eugénie Grandet, and several volumes of La Comédie humaine. His writing is distinguished by dense detail, a large cast of characters, and an intricate social network, often linking separate works through recurring figures to portray nineteenth-century French society. He excelled at depicting the power of desire, ambition, and money through precise settings and strong narrative tension, and he exerted a lasting influence on later realist fiction. Beyond the broad outline of his life, public information is limited, so this note focuses on the themes and style of his works.