Cafe Corner - Honore de Balzac

Legend has it that the prolific 19th century French writer  Honore de Balzac c. 20th May 1799 - 18th August 1850 had passed away after innumerable and copious quantities of this infamous brew, once scandalously known as the devil's own brew. The properties of literatti had not held itself back. Honore de Balzac had truly lived a driven life through flashes of inspiration. Though it cannot be said that the hallmark of genius and properties of inventiveness were found to be wanting through the course of his brief but prodigious literary career, Honore de Balzac could truly find his immense source of inspiration from a very humble dark drink known to stir the very heights of emotion and intellect. The property mantle of intellect had it's origins from this mere humble drink. Known to have arisen at the darkest hours, time knew not how to slow the seeds of genius when slumbers would have called another, lesser mortal man, to put down the pen and peacefully repose towards a mundane life of dim wittery.  

Indeed, once he had wrote -

"if those who are the enemies of innocent amusements had the direction of the world, they would take away the spring, and youth, the former from the year, the latter from human life ... "

Therefore, Honore de Balzac, we salute your genius and rever your name for it's literary glory.

Honore de Balzac is best know today for his enormous collection of books collectively titled La Comédie humaine and portraying French society of the early nineteenth century. At its inception after an insightful flash of true genius, and a cup of coffee, Honore de Balzac famously declared to his sister -

"I am about to become a genius!"

In the literary world the French writer Honore de Balzac is a name that is eternally coupled with the passion for coffee as much as the name of Samuel T. Coleridge, author of such fantastic visionary works such as - The Rime Of The Ancient Mariner, became synonymous with opium. 

Varying reports identify his daily consumption habits in the region of 10 - 50 cups! Depending of course which article you read.


Selected titles from La Comédie humaine -

    Les Chouans (1829)
    Sarrasine (1830)
    La Peau de chagrin (1831)
    Le Chef-d'œuvre inconnu (1831)
    Le Colonel Chabert (1832)
    Le Curé de Tours (1832)
    La Fille aux yeux d'or (1833)
    Eugénie Grandet (1833)
    Le Contrat de mariage (1835)
    Le Père Goriot (1835)
    Le Lys dans la vallée (1835)
    La Rabouilleuse (1842)
    Ursule Mirouët (1842)
    La Femme de trente ans (1829-1842)
    Illusions perdues (I, 1837; II, 1839; III, 1843)
    La Cousine Bette (1846)
    Le Cousin Pons (1847)
    Splendeurs et misères des courtisanes (1847)

Pieter Bergli - Cafe enthusiast, raconteur extraordinaire on the dark but illuminating property of the humble coffee bean...