Truth above all. Those people have no backbone. What
happens to them is inevitable. So much the worse for them."
This absorption in the domain of fancy was so complete at times as to
cause him to confuse it with the outside world. It is related that
Jules Sandeau, returning once from a journey, spoke to him of his
sister's illness. Balzac listened to him abstractedly for a while, and
then interrupted him: "All that, my friend, is very well," he said to
the astonished Jules, "but let us come back to reality; let us speak
of _Eugenie Grandet_."
It was the second great book of 1833; and, on the whole, exhibits the
novelist at his best. Eulogiums came from friends and enemies alike.
The critics were unanimous, too unanimous, indeed, for the author, who
detected in their chorus of praise a reiterated condemnation of much
of his previous production. At last, it even annoyed him to hear his
name invariably mentioned in connection with this single novel. "Those
who call me the father of Eugenie Grandet seek to belittle me," he
cried. "I grant it is a masterpiece, but a small one. They forbear to
cite the great ones."
His ill-humor was, of course, of later growth.
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