The Ball at Sceaux

Honoré de Balzac's portrait of the Comte de Fontaine opens on a man forged by loyalty, ruin, and political upheaval: an old Poitou royalist of ancient blood, he has sacrificed fortune for the Bourbon cause and never bent to imperial favor. Yet his devotion is tested in Paris, where he discovers that court gratitude is thin, patronage is selective, and sacrifice is easily forgotten. Balzac turns this into a sharp satire of Restoration politics, showing how power rewards tact, timing, and usefulness more reliably than principle. As fortunes shift again, Fontaine adapts with ironic skill, winning Louis XVIII.'s favor and turning royal influence into a family strategy. He secures offices for his sons and marriages for his daughters, while preaching moderation and social fusion in place of old rigidities. But his success is precarious, and a careless joke through his daughter Emilie threatens to cool the king's goodwill. Emilie herself is a brilliant, spoiled coquette—beautiful, commanding, and intolerably vain. Raised in luxury, she rejects suitors, resists counsel, and treats marriage as a stage for her own ambition. In the Fontaine household, where pride, money, and status collide, Balzac exposes the comic instability of a family and a society ruled by rank, vanity, and political favor. This edition has been fully restored with modern typesetting, custom cover design.