The Girl with the Golden Eyes

Name: The Girl with the Golden Eyes
Author: Honoré de Balzac

La Fille aux yeux d’or · French with an independent close English translation

The Girl with the Golden EyesNovella · ¶ 6

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French Page · Branch 7 of 66

Novella · ¶ 6

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French

p. 16

Aussi, dès qu’il arrive, agace-t-il les demoiselles de comptoir, dont les yeux vifs attirent force chalands; se gaudit au sein des parures, des fichus, de la mousseline façonnée par ces habiles ouvrières; ou, plus souvent encore, avant de dîner, il sert une pratique, copie une page du journal ou porte chez l’huissier quelque effet en retard. À six heures, tous les deux jours, il est fidèle à son poste. Inamovible basse-taille des chœurs, il se trouve à l’Opéra, prêt à y devenir soldat Arabe, prisonnier, sauvage, paysan, ombre, pate de chameau, lion, diable, génie, esclave, eunuque noir ou blanc, toujours expert à produire de la joie, de la douleur, de la pitié, de l’étonnement, à pousser d’invariables cris, à se taire, à chasser, à se battre, à représenter Rome ou l’Égypte; mais toujours in petto, mercier. À minuit, il redevient bon mari, homme, tendre père, il se glisse dans le lit conjugal, l’imagination encore tendue par les formes décevantes des nymphes de l’Opéra, et fait ainsi tourner, au profit de l’amour conjugal, les dépravations du monde et les voluptueux ronds de jambe de la Taglioni. Enfin, s’il dort, il dort vite, et dépêche son sommeil comme il a dépêché sa vie. N’est-ce pas le mouvement fait homme, l’espace incarné, le protée de la civilisation? Cet homme résume tout: histoire, littérature, politique, gouvernement, religion, art militaire. N’est-ce pas une encyclopédie vivante, un atlas grotesque, sans cesse en marche comme Paris et qui jamais ne repose? En lui tout est jambes. Aucune physionomie ne saurait se conserver pure en de tels travaux. Peut-être l’ouvrier qui meurt vieux à trente ans, l’estomac tanné par les doses progressives de son eau-de-vie, sera-t-il trouvé, au dire de quelques philosophes bien rentés, plus heureux que ne l’est le mercier. L’un périt d’un seul coup et l’autre en détail. De ses huit industries, de ses épaules, de son gosier, de ses mains, de sa femme et de son commerce, celui-ci retire, comme d’autant de fermes, des enfants, quelques mille francs et le plus laborieux bonheur qui ait jamais récréé cœur d’homme. Cette fortune et ces enfants, ou les enfants qui résument tout pour lui, deviennent la proie du monde supérieur, auquel il porte ses écus et sa fille, ou son fils élevé au collége, qui, plus instruit que ne l’est son père, jette plus haut ses regards ambitieux. Souvent le cadet d’un petit détaillant veut être quelque chose dans l’État.

The Girl with the Golden Eyes: Novella

p. 17

Thus, as soon as he arrives, he teases the young counter-women, whose lively eyes attract customers in force; makes merry amid ornaments, fichus, and muslin fashioned by these skillful workwomen; or, more often still, before dining, he serves a customer, copies a page of the newspaper, or carries some overdue bill to the bailiff. At six o'clock, every other day, he is faithful to his post. Immovable bass voice of the choruses, he is at the Opera, ready to become there Arab soldier, prisoner, savage, peasant, shade, camel's paw, lion, devil, genie, slave, black or white eunuch, always expert at producing joy, pain, pity, astonishment, at uttering invariable cries, at being silent, at hunting, at fighting, at representing Rome or Egypt; but always in petto, a haberdasher. At midnight, he becomes again good husband, man, tender father, he slips into the conjugal bed, his imagination still stretched by the deceptive forms of the nymphs of the Opera, and thus turns, to the profit of conjugal love, the depravities of the world and Taglioni's voluptuous circles of the leg. Finally, if he sleeps, he sleeps quickly, and dispatches his sleep as he has dispatched his life. Is this not movement made man, space incarnate, the Proteus of civilization? This man sums up everything: history, literature, politics, government, religion, military art. Is he not a living encyclopedia, a grotesque atlas, incessantly on the march like Paris and never resting? In him everything is legs. No physiognomy could preserve itself pure in such labors. Perhaps the worker who dies old at thirty, his stomach tanned by progressive doses of his brandy, will be found, according to some well-endowed philosophers, happier than the haberdasher is. One perishes at a single stroke and the other in detail. From his eight trades, from his shoulders, his throat, his hands, his wife, and his business, the latter draws, as from so many farms, children, a few thousand francs, and the most laborious happiness that has ever refreshed the heart of man. This fortune and these children, or the children who sum up everything for him, become the prey of the higher world, to which he carries his crowns and his daughter, or his son educated at college, who, better instructed than his father, casts his ambitious eyes higher. Often the younger son of a small retailer wants to be something in the State.

About This Reading Edition

Honoré de Balzac’s The Girl with the Golden Eyes turns Paris into a charged study of wealth, appetite, spectacle, secrecy, possession, and power. This exact page-aligned Literary Fiction edition presents the novella’s continuous movement in French with an independent close English translation prepared by Diotimos Editions.

Discussion Questions

Historical Text and Translation

The French reading text follows the 1843 Furne edition as presented in the Furne corrigé transcription at eBalzac and is checked, where needed, against the Gallica image of the volume. The original hierarchy, dedication to Eugène Delacroix, continuous sectioning, and closing 1834–1835 dateline are retained.

About Diotimos Editions

Diotimos Editions prepared this independent close translation directly from the French. Meaning, agency, logic, degree, reference, image, repetition, and ambiguity take precedence over elegance; Balzac’s clause order and long accumulations remain wherever grammatical English can bear them.