title: Ourika: The Original French Text (Texts and Translations) (French Edition)
author: Joan DeJean
description: Joan DeJean's books reflect her areas of research: the history of women's writing in France (<em>Tender Geographies: Women and the Origins of the Novel in France</em>); the history of sexuality (<em>Fictions of Sappho, 1546-1937</em>); the development of the novel (<em>Literary Fortifications</em>; <em>Libertine Strategies</em>); and the cultural history and the material culture of late 17th- and early 18th-century France (<em>Ancients against Moderns: Culture Wars and the Making of a Fin de Sicle</em>; <em>The Essence of Style, 2005; The Age of Comfort</em>).
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  ##### www.blackmask.com
  
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  A Prince of Bohemia  
    
  
  
  
  
  
  http://www.blackmask.com
  
  
  # A Prince of Bohemia
  
  
  ### Honore de Balzac
  
  
  ##### Translated by Clara Bell and others
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  DEDICATION
  
  
  
  
  
  To Henri Heine.
  
  
  
  
  
  I inscribe this to you, my dear Heine, to you that represent in
  
  
  Paris the ideas and poetry of Germany, in Germany the lively and
  
  
  witty criticism of France; for you better than any other will know
  
  
  whatsoever this Study may contain of criticism and of jest, of
  
  
  love and truth.
  
  
  
  
  
  DE BALZAC.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  "My dear friend," said Mme. de la Baudraye, drawing a pile of
  
  
  manuscript from beneath her sofa cushion, "will you pardon me in our
  
  
  present straits for making a short story of something which you told
  
  
  me a few weeks ago?"
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  "Anything is fair in these times. Have you not seen writers serving up
  
  
  their own hearts to the public, or very often their mistress' hearts
  
  
  when invention fails? We are comi