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The Commission in Lunacy

Honoré de Balzac (1799 - 1850)
Translated by Clara Bell (1835 - 1927)

“The Commission in Lunacy” is a short novel first published in 1836 with the French title “L’interdiction” (i.e., “The Ban” or “The Prohibition”). An aristocratic woman wants the courts to declare her estranged husband mentally incompetent to manage his own affairs. To achieve this, the petition must pass through the hands of an examining judge — a man of old-fashioned integrity and conscience. In this story of Parisian society, we see Balzac developing techniques of rich character portrayal and psychological realism. - Summary by Bruce Pirie

Genre(s): Literary Fiction, Published 1800 -1900

Language: English

Keyword(s): morality (50), realism (49), justice (26), greed (14), materialism (13), Conscience (10), 19th century france (8), 19th century paris (2)