Books: Napoleon and the Shopkeeper

BALZAC by V.S. PRITCHETT 272 pages. Knopf. $15.

This is a kind of literary marriage that is becoming increasingly popular: a longish essay on a suitably cultural subject wedded to lavish and largely relevant illustration. In the case of Balzac, the union is not exactly bliss. One might wish to trade some of the Paris street scenes for more text, but the subject would probably overwhelm any possible approach.

Balzac wrote the way some men talk: compulsively, brilliantly, endlessly. In a career of only 21 years he managed to get down on paper all...

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