Shagreen leather
9.99 €
7.99 €
The only thing available 1
Shagreen leather
9.99 €
7.99 €
"Shagreen skin" - another novel from the "Scenes of life in Paris" large cycle "The Human Comedy", written by O. de Balzac in 1830-1831 gg. The author paints a picture of the life of a simple man, whose fate is intertwined with the ancient mystical talisman of the mysterious East.
Illustrations for the novel created by French artist of the XIX century. Charles Ward. His works emphasize the social orientation of the work. With the light hand of Balzac, the expression "shagreen skin" became a catchphrase. So you can call any important resource that quickly and irreversibly melts away. For example, it can be time, opportunities or finances. Shagreen is a well-made soft goat or sheep skin with a characteristic rough surface. In Balzac's novel "Shagreen Leather" a piece of such shagreen plays the role of a mystical and powerful talisman, which the protagonist Raphael de Valentin acquires in an antique shop. The young man is ready to kill himself from chronic poverty, but the talisman saves the unfortunate, because this leather is able to fulfill any wishes of its owner. This is evidenced by the mysterious inscription on it, which, according to the antique dealer, made in Sanskrit. However, for each realized dream has to pay. The skin, which symbolizes the life of its owner, inevitably shrinks each time. In the large-scale cycle "The Human Comedy", which Balzac began to write, having crossed the thirty-year threshold, the novel "Shagreen skin" is referred to the "Philosophical Etudes". Unusual mystical plot of the novel allowed the writer to reflect on the underlying desires of people, and the price that often have to pay for their realization in life. Curiously, in the first edition of the novel, published in 1831, Balzac gave the content of the magical inscription only in French. It had the form of a triangle, beginning with the line "Possessing me, you will possess everything...". The inscription had 45 words and 237 letters without articles. The "original" inscription appeared only in the 1838 edition, but it was not in Sanskrit, but in Arabic. Baron Josef von Hammer-Purgstahl, a prominent Austrian orientalist, helped translate the magic text invented by Balzac. In his entry, a mark was made which the typesetters mistook for a letter. In another fluently written word, they replaced the original letter with another letter similar in appearance, losing the meaning of the phrase. As a result, in the 1839 edition, the Arabic text was reproduced with two errors. In later publications of the novel, including its Russian and English translations, the inaccuracies in the magic formula in Arabic only increased, and only in this edition is it reproduced absolutely correctly, according to Hammer's original recording.
Illustrations for the novel created by French artist of the XIX century. Charles Ward. His works emphasize the social orientation of the work. With the light hand of Balzac, the expression "shagreen skin" became a catchphrase. So you can call any important resource that quickly and irreversibly melts away. For example, it can be time, opportunities or finances. Shagreen is a well-made soft goat or sheep skin with a characteristic rough surface. In Balzac's novel "Shagreen Leather" a piece of such shagreen plays the role of a mystical and powerful talisman, which the protagonist Raphael de Valentin acquires in an antique shop. The young man is ready to kill himself from chronic poverty, but the talisman saves the unfortunate, because this leather is able to fulfill any wishes of its owner. This is evidenced by the mysterious inscription on it, which, according to the antique dealer, made in Sanskrit. However, for each realized dream has to pay. The skin, which symbolizes the life of its owner, inevitably shrinks each time. In the large-scale cycle "The Human Comedy", which Balzac began to write, having crossed the thirty-year threshold, the novel "Shagreen skin" is referred to the "Philosophical Etudes". Unusual mystical plot of the novel allowed the writer to reflect on the underlying desires of people, and the price that often have to pay for their realization in life. Curiously, in the first edition of the novel, published in 1831, Balzac gave the content of the magical inscription only in French. It had the form of a triangle, beginning with the line "Possessing me, you will possess everything...". The inscription had 45 words and 237 letters without articles. The "original" inscription appeared only in the 1838 edition, but it was not in Sanskrit, but in Arabic. Baron Josef von Hammer-Purgstahl, a prominent Austrian orientalist, helped translate the magic text invented by Balzac. In his entry, a mark was made which the typesetters mistook for a letter. In another fluently written word, they replaced the original letter with another letter similar in appearance, losing the meaning of the phrase. As a result, in the 1839 edition, the Arabic text was reproduced with two errors. In later publications of the novel, including its Russian and English translations, the inaccuracies in the magic formula in Arabic only increased, and only in this edition is it reproduced absolutely correctly, according to Hammer's original recording.
See also:
- All books by the publisher
- All books by the author
- All books in the series Library of World Literature