The reflection of all this in the
_Comedy_ was calculated to impress at its hour, and the hour arrived.
Men looked at the counterfeit presentment and wondered why no one had
recognized these things sooner. From that moment, the reputation of
the _Comedie Humaine_ was made. Perhaps, after all, in such
connection, the one or two of Balzac's plays that went so resolutely
off the old lines--the _Resources of Quinola_ and _Mercadet_,--may
have served, in remembrance, despite their insignificance beside the
novels, which were the true drama, to awaken the attention of
professional dramatists, especially as one after another story of the
_Comedy_ was dramatized. But it was the fund of observation and the
leaven of satire which startled, aroused, and ultimately set the stage
agog. Not even the lighter forms of composition were left unaffected.
Labiche, in the vaudeville style, with his _Voyage de Monsieur
Perrichon_ and _La Cagnotte_, gave his audience, behind his puppets,
the touch of present reality, the sensation of existent follies.
The relative slowness with which the novels of Balzac's younger
contemporaries and his successors were penetrated with realism was
partly due to the lasting effect of George Sand's idealistic fiction.
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